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Kitty Calash

~ Confessions of a Known Bonnet-Wearer

Kitty Calash

Tag Archives: rant

Clear and Present Danger

24 Tuesday Oct 2017

Posted by kittycalash in Living History, personal, Philosophy, Reenacting

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

authenticity, Critical Theory, difficult interpretations, feminism, interpretation, rant, Revolutionary War, ripostes

A Female Philosopher in Extasy at Solving a Problem. London, England; about 1770 Mezzotint and engraving with watercolor on laid paper
Colonial Williamsburg Foundation

Scandal and outrage rock the reenacting world as reading comprehension lags and The Gentle Author is accused of presentism– or, at least, that’s the most reasonable translation I have for comments made about me last night on social media, including:

Yeah- she’s got great stuff. But I feel awful that she fell into a modern-think trap.

and, my favorite,

I’d say its a post modern Critical Theory think trap. Frankfort [sic] School is gushing from the pores.

Let’s take this apart, shall we? The Frankfurt School (not this place) was a social and political movement based in Frankfurt am Main in the immediate post-World War I years. After 1933, the school, formally known as the Institute for Social Research, moved to Columbia University in New York city. Being insulted by association with the likes of Walter Benjamin and Theodor Adorno is a new experience for me; I’m more usually associated with the ideas of Mary Daly and Jacques Derrida but I’ll take backhanded intellectual flattery where I can get it. (Also, thanks for thinking of me, but Kitty does not require your pity.)

More seriously, the postings last night (which happened while I was in class and have been deleted) brought to mind two powerful issues in living history and the reenacting community: Presentism and Feminism (with its unholy shadow, mansplaining).

Let’s go over these:

Presentism: uncritical adherence to present-day attitudes, especially the tendency to interpret past events in terms of modern values and concepts.

Feminism: The radical notion that women are people. the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes.

My recent post about MoAR’s Occupied Philadelphia event was accused of presentism, or “falling into a modern-think trap” and a “Critical Theory trap.” Here’s how that post came about:

Images were posted to Facebook, and I was tagged in one that showed me in the midst of a crowd that included members of the 17th Regiment of Infantry, one of the forces that occupied Philadelphia in 1777. My cousin, ever the wag, commented:

click to enlarge in a new window

“I suppose you hang out with Confederates, too,” had some bite. What surprised me was my well-educated and thoughtful cousin’s facile conflation of Confederates and British. Is the world that easily black-and-white, good-and-bad, Manichaen? Not usually, and certainly not usually to my cousin. Explanations seemed in order. Why had I done what I did, and what did I do? What was Occupied Philadelphia about?*

To me, it offered the chance for some complicated interpretation that’s more readily accessible via living history than by exhibit panel, or at least significantly more engaging than text. How do you elucidate the complexity of the American Revolution? How do you get people to think about the past in the past’s terms? How do you get them to query and interrogate their accepted understandings of history?

Apparently that position towards living history– that it is complicated, worthy of criticism, can be used to create a complicated look at the past, and can be understood through cultural criticism– is deserving of the dog-whistle scorn of men hiding behind false names on social media. It elicits from them suggestions for interpretation that include impressions already being done, and referenced in the original post. It elicits suggestions based on 1811 paintings of Philadelphia, because of course, nothing helps illuminate 1777 Philadelphia like a genre painting made 34 years later.

If anything, I was suggesting that complicated interpretations (that is, showing how an “occupying force” might be “good” for the population) can further an understanding of the past that helps us understand the present. Isn’t that the mission of most history organizations? Understanding the past to illuminate the present and shape the future? It’s unsettling to realize so immediately how people who practice history use it to reinforce the status quo, and use misreadings of interpretation to further their own sense of superiority.

That’s where feminism comes in: suggesting “new” roles for women in living history (Laundry? How ’bout being a Quaker?) on a page dedicated to women’s history is a dizzying feat of sexist thinking. It is particularly delightful given that the Gentle Author and her associate, Our Girl History, are among the people who have suggested new roles for women, and have organized events that included suggested roles, and in fact required them. But please, tell me what to do. Belittle me by association with some of the leading critics of the 20th century. Because when you do, you reveal yourself not only to me, but to others.

Sarah Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough. Oil on canvas by Charles Jervas.

As Our Girl History wrote recently, women’s voices in living history are too often silenced in the present by excuse of the past. That anti-feminist approach was on view last night, and continues to be the default setting for many men in living history. It reflects a persistent bias against intelligent, educated women, like the Female Philosopher.  It reflects a persistent position that women should “know their place:”

The greatest sin a woman could commit was to participate in any sort of public life, be it theatre, politics, or social causes – this made her immediately ‘difficult’

–Margaret Perry on “difficult” women in the long 18th century.)

It will not remain a viable position for long.

 

*Brits-as-Nazis is not my origination, but the distillation of a comment made about the dedication of a monument at Guilford courthouse and subsequently reported to me. Despite a commenter’s attempt to attribute the equation to me, it is not mine, as should have been clear from “in certain circles.” Not my circles, not my monkeys.

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Same Place, Different Day

17 Saturday Jan 2015

Posted by kittycalash in History, Living History, Museums, Philosophy, Reenacting

≈ 7 Comments

Tags

accuracy, authenticity, history event, history events, interpretation, living history, museum practice, rant, Reenacting

We were doing some preliminary planning for an event this fall, and we were considering recreating the 1803 funeral of Important White Guy. Our event is in October; the funeral was in September. Somebody asked me, “What does it matter when we do it?” and I didn’t respond nearly as gracefully or eloquently as I could have.

Why does it matter? Does it matter to anyone but me and my cohort?

It does, and here’s one reason why: When interpreting the funeral in late October, perhaps a member of the public will ask, “When did he die?” Can an interpreter really say “September 20” and not expect a slew of questions about how long the body was kept and why the funeral was delayed and wasn’t that a health hazard? Can the event orientation start out with “We’re doing it in October because that’s when we want to do it,” without fundamentally changing the event?

On the Colony House steps

August is hot. Can we riot in September? No!

Moving the recreation of a specific event by more than it takes to get to a weekend* seems dishonest to me: do you really want to celebrate your birthday 5 weeks after the actual date for someone else’s convenience? July 4th: Gosh, it’s not working for me this year. Let’s do that in August.

For a historical organization to suspend caring about accuracy for living history events but not for published articles, catalog records, or finding aids just contributes to the greater problem in and of living history.

When asked about the goal of a living history event, I have been told, “Well, we want families, right? So we should have some hands-on activities, you know, immersive, like candle dipping.”+

It took a bit, but at last I grasped the core of the angry-making: Kids like living history, therefore it is less sophisticated than other forms of history.

The right place for immersive string activities.

The right place for immersive string activities.

Living history is not as sophisticated, nor need it be as accurate, as traditional (written, orated, curated) historical presentations: I think that is the background assumption a lot of people make, both in the adminstration of traditional historical organizations and in the presentation on the field. It is a complete fallacy.

Living history done well and done right is as well-researched as a paper, exhibition, or article. It draws from primary sources both written and visual, it requires the absorption of countless secondary sources to help analyze the primary sources. It is as collaborative and negotiated a process as any museum exhibition, and like exhibitions, it uses material culture interpretation to deliver its messages, i.e. meet its educational and interpretive goals.

15316751814_946818c254_z

A good living history event is beautiful, but like a ballet, that beauty does not come easily. There are no shortcuts, and beauty does not equal superficial or stupid. It indicates sophistication. Part of that appeal is accuracy: the better, the more accurate and immersive the historical setting and action you create, the more visitors can learn without asking.

Lawn games

Lawn games

When I organize an event in our house at work (or even on a guided tour) one of my interpretive points is always “people saw the world differently– literally– and this event/house tour helps you see the world of 1800 the way people living then saw it.” Aesthetics were different, and were underpinned by ideas and opinions. But understanding those aesthetics and the opinions people held about race, gender, beauty, work and class takes actual research and analysis. It’s not all putting on a pretty dress and cavorting on the lawn. Facts matter. Accuracy matters.

Museums are some of the most trusted organizations. If we started juicing facts like every History channel show, we’d lose that trust, and rightly so. Our trustworthiness is grounded in our honesty and integrity.

Living history events are mobile museums, and every reenactor curates his or her own impression. To retain the trust and interest of the public, we have to be accurate.

*Events are moved to weekends because that’s when interpreters and audiences can come.

+This at a house that not only lacks a working kitchen earlier than 1960 in the staff area and was owned by a partner in a candle factory. I’m thinking “bought ’em in bulk,” here, not dipping.

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Holy time piece, Batman!

27 Saturday Apr 2013

Posted by kittycalash in Art Rant

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

advertising, auctions, Chanel, commodities, copy writing, fashion, Museums, rant, Sotheby's, watches

From Sotheby's Preview magazine

From Sotheby’s Preview magazine

We had some fun with this at work on Thursday. The slightly awful truth is that these catalogs and publications for the super-rich and fabulously fat-walleted arrive with regularity at the historical-cultural complexes that comprise the workplaces of under-paid and over-educated aesthetes, fueling their impotent rage about the eroding American dream. We had several performances of the Reading of the Watch Ad, appreciating the high craft and art of the copy and design.

I’m a Mad Men addict for all the wrong reasons (management tips! vicarious vices!) but long-time fan of advertising, copy writing, and graphic design. As a child, I launched, wrote and self-published F.U.S.S., the members’ newsletter of the Felix Unger Sympatico Society, for which my mother served as managing editor and my father the sole subscriber. This was really direct marketing, or taunting, as the case may be.

But we made a kind of cult of design in my household, so I knew as a kid what Y&R stood for, or DMBB. Mad Men sucked me right in, so when this turned up, I was ready.

This ad is the inside front cover and first page of the Sotheby’s Preview magazine which features Jeff Koons’ vacuum cleaner sculpture for $15M or so. This is serious walking around money, and if you are going to recline in your Manhattan penthouse (hope it’s pre-war) admiring the Koons while your maid vacuums before a party, this is the watch to time her with.

Copy Writer's dream, or nightmare?

The copy combines naughtiness with auction catalog sentence structure, like a sexed-up museum label.

High feminine complication, this flying tourbillon decorated with the motif of the camellia, a tribute to Mademoiselle Chanel’s favorite flower, beats away discreetly and almost secretly at the heart of the Première watch.

That last clause screams affair. When I read, all I can think of is Roger Sterling in a hotel room with his mistress. A colleague said this kind of watch was only given to rapper’s girlfriends—the serious ones—but at $286,814 (last year’s price), perhaps it’s a “don’t divorce me and take half my empire” celebrity wife present. Tisch and the Winklevoss twins were in the event pictures of this Preview, and this watch does scream nouveau riche, not Astor money (that was a fur trade fortune, originally).

Where it gets really fun, I think, is when the text takes on the style of an auction catalog lot description:

Having no upper bridge, the carriage decorated with a camellia appears to be rotating in a weightless state. Limited edition of 20 numbered pieces. 18-carat white gold, set with 228 diamonds (~7.7 carats).

“Having no upper bridge” is a technical description that reminds me of the dentally challenged with poor memories and no mirrors. Note that camellia is repeated here—perhaps to help you recognize the motif, because I’m not sure it reads very clearly.

There it is, the quarter-of-a-million-dollar watch, advertised in a magazine promoting artwork for tens of millions of dollars, pieces that a colleague noted would be displayed in the penthouse for a party and then put into storage as an investment until the art advisor said it was time to sell for a profit. Art as commodity, produced like commodities now, from Warhol to Koons to Hirst.

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