I feel the two questions asked:

• What are the challenges we face as history educators with presenting the past in the digital world?
• How have digital tools made it easier to teach about and help our audience(s) engage with the past?

have been answered in previous assignments.  But as I read, Coslett and Chalana I was drawn into other questions which have been touched on, but seem to justify more conscious thought.

• How are digital tools and methods changing our “public history identity”?
• What potential forms of history can be developed utilizing digital methods?
• How can historians master these forms as they arise?
• What is the appropriate role of history in shaping a changing national culture?

I feel even Coslett and Chalana’s recent review of the challenges faced by the National Park Service in recognizing and responding to demographic tides and trying to create more inclusive “stories”, was dated and missing the point.  The fundamental decline in visitors is not just about the presentation of “stories” told, it is about a culture that no longer sees the outdoors as a space to relax and escape the pressures of life.  It is about a culture that no longer seeks to “memorialize”, preserve traditions or educate by viewing monuments or homes of the past.  How is our “digital world” removing us from the physical one and what does that mean?

This reflection does not mean in any way to disparage the efforts of the National Parks.  I agree with the articles’ premise that our “stories” need to reflect the complexity and diversity of the true populations and our history, but we need to do more than that.  The fundamental message of this course has been engagement – learning by doing.  Most of our traditions, institutions and structures were created in the last century to respond to the needs of an industrial society.  We are just moving into the digital economy, industry and culture and as historians we have to be more diligent in recognizing the cultural shifts that are occurring through the transition.  Sitting was a luxury when people stood at machines all day.  Families went to the parks for healthy “fresh air & sunlight” apart from the dark factories and smog.  History was authoritarian and monumental.  In a culture that sits at screens all day, yet views gaming as preferred entertainment, individual tweets or self-publication as significant public information and sunlight as threatening (are you armed with lotion and bug spray?) – we are going to have adapt our interpretations and methods.

How can San Juan Island investigate its prehistoric past and can modern crowd-sourcing methods help?  Could digital mapping help the Cayuse regain and expand its understanding of the past?  What were the epidemic diseases of the Oregon Trail and could their causes, remedies, impacts and genetics be identified, interpreted and used to forge bonds between the many peoples of the West?  Is there such a thing as a “future past” that can be created and how much must we rely on the ‘Ancients’ to create it? (Grethlein)  Or can we draw the public into creating digital histories and identities?  Can we make fiction  more engaging then nonfiction and mythology?  Perhaps the next marketing campaign for the National Parks can be “Help us Create a New National Identity!”

Note:

Coslett, Daniel E., and Manish Chalana. “National Parks for New Audiences. Diversifying Interpretation for Enhanced Contemporary Relevance.” The Public Historian 38, no. 4: 101-128. November 2016.

Grethlein, Jonas. “Future Past”: Time and Teleology in (Ancient) Historiography” in History & Theory v. 53 n. 3, October 2014. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/hith.10715 accessed 7/11/2018.