blog.preservationleadershipforum.org//2014/01/22/old-places-matter-identity-2-2/#.UuBAf2TTkYK
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Independence Hall
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
en.wikipedia.org |
Hello Everyone:
Today, I would like to stay on the topic of memory and national identity. I know that yesterday's post on the pros and cons of the continued preservation of Auschwitz was depressing. Therefore, today's post is more upbeat. Thompson Mayes recently posted an interesting blog post on the
Preservation Leadership Forum titled "Why Do Old Places Matter? Civicm State, National, and Universal Identity." In it, he focus on the bold-faced American monuments that have a place in both the collective history and consciousness of the United States. Places like Independence Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, The Alamo in San Antonio, Texas, Pearl Harbor in Honolulu, Hawai'i, and many more all evoke the timeline of American history that stretches back to its pre-colonial period. Other places like Gettysburg and the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama evoke not only history but the foundational principles of this nation. Just as these places are readily identified with America, there are old places throughout the world that also embody a collective identity: Zen garden symbolize Japan, stone cottages with thatched roof evoke Ireland, the Pyramids, and the monuments of Greek and Roman antiquity are prized as symbols of our common identity. These and many other old places: city, region, state, national, or universal maintain and transform our civic identity.
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Tomb of the Unknown Soldier
Arlington, Virginia
en.wikipedia.org |
It is a misconception that Americans don't care about old places. Quite the contrary, we, like people around the world, do care about the places that embody our collective identity whether at the national or civic level, broadly cultural, for better or worse. We speak with great fondness and pride when an old place threatened. From the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier to the Civil War battlefields in Virginia, the site of the epic Battle of the Wilderness, individuals make the effort to save them because they matter to our sense of national self. The Civil War Trust
(http://www.civilwar.org) notes on its website, "Can you imagine a fast-food restaurant in the middle of Arlington Cemetery?...Can you imagine destroying the remaining original copies of the Declaration of Independence? Of course not...each square foot of battlefield land consumed, whole chapters of America's history are being ripped out of the the book of our national memory..." Once this heritage is gone, it's gone forever and never can be replaced.
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Battle of the Wilderness site
Spotsylvania and Orange Counties, Virginia
usa-civil-war.com |
For the past seventy-five years, the federal government has enacted policies to preserve places related to national identity. The key drivers of this movement have patriotism and national identity. (The Historic Sites Act of 1935, 16 U.S.C. 461) Thompson Mayes adds one caveat,"... we aren't as single-minded or critical about our national identity as we may have been..." Even though many people have stated that patriotism and national identity are the prime reason old paces matter, some preservationists are hesitant to invoke either one as the motivation for saving old places. According to Mr, Mayes, this reflects what Edward Said described as, "...vexed issue of nationalism and national identity, of how memories of the past are shaped in accordance with a certain notion of what "we" or, for that matter, "they" really are." (Said, 2000)
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Daisy Bates House
nps.gov |
What is this vexing issue of national identity and how can we speak responsibly about place that reflect our national or other sense of self? Many of the first places saved from demolition celebrated an idea of a share American heritage-an all encompassing American identity. Organizations such as the Daughters of the American Revolutions, the National Society of The Colonial Dames of America, and many other state and local groups saved old places in order to promote American ideals. These old places inspired people to learn about American history and culture, while acting as a signifier of American identity. At the same time, they also represented what we aspired to be as a nation. Numerous writers and scholars have been critical about the what was preserved as part of our national identity, by whom and what purpose. (See, e.g. Barthel, 2004) I have been asked the same question, "What makes something preservation-worthy?" As a preservationist myself, I am often aware of the fact that the places saved from the wrecking ball tend to whitewash history in such a way that it leaves out a more comprehensive view of history. The presence of slaves is not acknowledged in the plantation houses, the Native-Americans in the missions, the ethnic communities in the cities they helped build. Yet all these anonymous places, built and inhabited by countless of anonymous people, are just as vital to who we are as nation as the bold-faced names.
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Historic Textile Mill
Lowell, Massachusetts
nps.gov |
I agree with Thompson Mayes' assertion that the process of redefining who "we" are is an ongoing journey. In contemporary times, our old places are reflect a more diverse history. For example, the textile mill town of Lowell, Massachusetts, a National Park since 1978. The Steel mills in Pittsburgh have been saved and slavery on the southern plantations is acknowledged. I also agree with Mr. Mayes' statement that is it critically important for people, who are actively involved in preservation, to acknowledge the exclusive history of the field and continue to insist that that the untold stories be brought to light if we are to continue to redefine what American-ness is. If you travel across the United States, Alaska, and Hawai'i; talk to a cross-section of people, you will get a wide range of what this nation is about, who it's for, and what it stands for. This is a good thing because it helps reshape and re-form, and maybe, deepen our understanding of history and identity. The old places are the perfect setting to these discussions and debates.
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Corinth Plantation
Corinth, Mississippi
preservationnation.org |
Edward Relph, a geographer who first formulated theories about place wrote that when he reflected back on his early work,
"I realize that place and sense of place, which I then represented as mostly positive, have some very ugly aspects. they can, for instance be the basis for exclusionary practices, for parochialism, and for xenophobia. There is ample evidence of this in such things as NIMBY attitudes, gated communities, and, more dramatically, the political fragmentation and ethnic cleansing that beset parts of Europe and Africa and that some sometimes justified by appeals to place identity." (Relph,
Environment & Architectural Phenomenology Newsletter, 1996)
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Palace of the People's Assembly
Berlin, former East Germany
stadtentwicklung,berlin,de |
Nationalism and national identity have an ominous legacy. Thompson Mayes cites his own encounters with Fascist-era buildings in Rome. He writes, "Mussolini made dramatic changes to the city plan and built hundreds of buildings, many of which consciously sought to tie the Fascist regime with Imperial Rome...The Fascist identity Mussolini sought to create was utterly discredited with the defeat of the Axis in World War II. But the buildings remain and are actively used today..." Mr Mayes also shares his experience of viewing a film made by Reynold Reynolds, filmmaker and colleague at the American Academy in Rome, about the demolition of the Palace of the Republic in Berlin, the former site of the People's Assembly of East Germany. The Palace, built between 1973 and 1974, was located on the former site of the Berliner Schloss (heavily damaged by bombs during the war and destroyed by the German Democratic Republic in 1950), was possibly the most symbolically powerful site in Berlin. As a signifier of the ideology of the GDR, the Palace was without question
the symbol of national identity. However, that identity was no longer valued once Germany was reunified. The point of this film was to that many Berliners viewed the demolition of the building as a lost opportunity to acknowledge that part of their history.
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Monticello, Charlotte, Virginia
Thomas Jefferson
en.wikipedia.org |
The ongoing presence of old places allows the acknowledgment of history as our former national selves and the transformation of that former self, over time, as part of the process national redefinition. For example, Thomas Jefferson's Monticello, now, doesn't hide the fact that the third President of the United States was a slave owner. The presence of the his former slaves and their descendants are visible on the site. The site is a good venue for an understanding of this aspect of American which could lead to a deeper meaning of national identity. Thompson Mayes notes that people say that the concept of identity is different in America than in Europe, which tend to be homogenous cultures. I would agree with this because to me, what constitutes an American identity is more pluralistic view. There is no such thing as a singular American ethnicity. An American identity is made up of different things: race, religion, ethnicity. Each of these is part of a larger definition what American-ness is. It's incredibly difficult to fix a definition of what is an American identity because there never was one definition.
Finally, I want to go back to yesterday's post on the preservation of Auschwitz. I stated that this place of the unspeakable horror should be preserved because it is part of our global identity. It is also part of Polish history. No doubt there are people how would like to see these reminders of a dark and evil past vanish for good but I would argue that that's not what history and historic preservation is about. Yes, we all love our great, heroic, triumphal monuments that celebrate the happy times but we also need those places of darkness. The dark places are a more authentic and honest reading of history because they are part of who we are. Camps such as Auschwitz remind us of what evil humanity is capable of and hopefully we'll someday learn from it. Our old places are symbols of who we are as a nation, good, bad, or indifferent.
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