Uncomfortable Truths and Hushed Silence: A Re-Examination of Interpretation and its Social Justice Role within Historic Preservation

Simple item page
dc.contributor.authorHall, Gloria D.
dc.contributor.programMA in Historic Preservationen_US
dc.date.accessioned2016-03-31T16:30:01Z
dc.date.available2016-03-31T16:30:01Z
dc.date.issued2015
dc.description.abstractIf interpretation is to make connections between places, time, and people then historic preservation interpreters must comprehensively tell the story of places, events, objects, and ordinary and significant people associated with noble and not so noble sides of history. Historic cultural resources associated with uncomfortable truths are susceptible to “obliteration” and subject to the same issues of change as other resources. The passing of time and use, environmental conditions, climate change, social attitudes, new scholarship, and information that reveals hidden truths and secrets create the need to re-interpret. One of the most divisive if not the most divisive event in American history, chattel slavery, has to be re-presented with “contextualized” narrative that recognizes “particular” details of both the celebrated hero and enslaved people. This evaluation of how the lives of enslaved Africans and African Americans are being re-interpreted at eight colonial to antebellum period plantations - five National Park Service units and three private entities - models how perceived changes in the public memory of slavery is currently being presented. The result of the critical analysis of conservation treatments, narrative language, “bound and unbound,” and use of cultural arts and technology indicate to present relevant 21st Century presentations reflective of multiple social significances requires an interpretive-centered field of historic preservation. Using a theory-to-practice approach, guidelines for comprehensive presentations at plantations move interpretation to the center of historic preservation, incorporating the principle of change into the language of the instruments and practices of the field, making it replicable for other topics.en_US
dc.format.extent160 p.en_US
dc.genrethesesen_US
dc.identifierdoi:10.13016/M23T7H
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/11603/2649
dc.language.isoen_USen_US
dc.relation.isAvailableAtGoucher College, Baltimore, MD
dc.rightsTo view a complete copy of this thesis please contact Goucher College Special Collections & Archives at archives@goucher.edu or (410) 337-6075.
dc.subjecthistoric preservation practicesen_US
dc.subjectinterpretationen_US
dc.subjectchattel slaveryen_US
dc.subjectNational Park Service plantationsen_US
dc.subjectCritical Race Theoryen_US
dc.subjectpublic memoryen_US
dc.subjecttheory-to-practiceen_US
dc.subjectcultural artsen_US
dc.subjectreconstructionen_US
dc.subjectbounden_US
dc.subjectunbounden_US
dc.subject.lcshHistoric preservation -- Theses
dc.subject.lcshSlavery -- United States -- Collective memory
dc.subject.lcshPlantations -- Historic preservation
dc.subject.lcshCritical race theory
dc.titleUncomfortable Truths and Hushed Silence: A Re-Examination of Interpretation and its Social Justice Role within Historic Preservationen_US
dc.typeTexten_US

Files

License bundle
Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
No Thumbnail Available
Name:
license.txt
Size:
1.6 KB
Format:
Item-specific license agreed upon to submission
Description:
Download

Collections

Goucher College MA in Historic Preservation