Connection to the Past

Roy Rosenzweig and David Thelen. The Presence of the Past: Popular Uses of History in American Life. New York: Columbia University Press. 1998. Pp. x, 291. $27.50.

This book by Roy Rosenzweig and David Thelen is extraordinarily important for all historians: those who work in the academy, in public venues, or in elementary and secondary classrooms. The book underscores what many in our profession have suspected for a long time: people who say that they do not like history are not dismissing history from their lives but rather saying that they are put off by classroom and lecture hall history because it appears so very disconnected from their personal experience. Recently, I gave a talk on community and history at a local bookstore. A young woman raised her hand and observed that the past was not useful to her; she lived in the present and saw little value in searching the past for clues to the present. Because she was accompanied by an older woman, I asked her how she had formed a friendship with her companion, suggesting that the relationship was constructed by mutual revelation of life stories, personal history. Yes, she responded, the woman next to her was her mother, and of course her mother had told her many stories about her family, her youth, and long-gone relatives. And yes, these stories revealed who she was, established personal identity, and defined her place in the world around her. This obvious loss of connection between what the young woman defined as history and her own intimate use of the past is exactly the point quantified in this ground-breaking book through interviews with a diverse group of informants and analysis by the authors.