People's History

The focus of our Public History Masters program is basically how to bring academic history to the public. This means learning about the different theories and approaches to history in public forums such as museums, archives, and historic centres. This is learning about history and then taking it a step further and communicating it. Historical facts are less important than the ways in which history communicates, which is somewhat counter-intuitive to traditional academic historians. We have noticed in the program that very few people, including others in the history field, know what public history is even though the work of it surrounds people everyday. Treena Hein's article, "History for the people" in November's University Affairs magazine remarks on the new shift in attention public history is receiving as a valid and necessary component of historical education. What history is being told is the central question historians, curators, archivists, and historical interpreters need to be asking themselves. This article describes an important process in the recognition of the need for such programs as public history that takes academia and makes it applicable and useful by bringing it to the public. It is essential for people to have access to their history. By keeping it locked up in the ivory tower, history becomes self-serving and known to only a few.