Living History: Reconstructing the Past for the Edification of the Present
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Date
2011-06
Authors
Cranton, Lindsey J.
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Abstract
Museum education is an amazingly broad and diverse field. Museums everywhere have
their own ideas and procedures that shape the way in which they educate their visitors. Living
history has become an increasingly popular way in the United States and abroad in which to
educate the general public about historic events that have occurred in our communal pasts.
Living history museums are a unique and proportionally small number of museums which
postulate that learning can be an immersive and enjoyable experience. Living history museums
are life size dioramas that visitors can interact with and that require active participation of all of
our human senses.
Education at living history museums is designed to be fun and engaging, and is
constantly trying to instill in visitors of all ages, a sense of wonder and excitement for both their
natural and built environments. This type of ‘edutainment’ is a more viable option to the dry and
outdated modes of education that are found in traditional history museums. People learn best
from experiences that they enjoy. This new integration of education with entertainment and
multiple forms of communication have made living history museums livelier and more engaging
places. This paper will examine the educational experience provided for young visitors to
America’s living history museums. Two of America’s most notable and popular living history
museums will be examined; Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia and the partnership of Historic
Jamestowne and the Jamestowne Settlement, Virginia. This capstone will address the question:
are living history museums effective tools and institutions for the studying, learning, and
understanding of specific time periods in the past?
The conclusions in this work are that while historical interpretation at living history
museums is not always historically accurate, it is still an effective and engaging set of tools and
methods that can be utilized to teach visitors about a diverse range of subjects; anthropology,
archaeology, academic history, landscape architecture, social history, historical geography,
material cultural studies and interpretation, landscape archaeology, and regional folklife. The
first American living history institutions, such as Colonial Williamsburg, helped to create a broad
way in which to educate their visitors about the past and the values that were perceived important
at the time. More modernized institutions, such as the conjoined Historic Jamestowne and the
Jamestowne Settlement have furthered the living history industry’s ability to create meaningful
and wondrous programming without straying too far from academically defined ‘truths’.
Description
41 p. A MASTER’S CAPSTONE
Presented to the Arts and Administration Program of the University of Oregon
in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the
Degree of Master of Science in Arts Management,
June 2011
Keywords
Edutainment, Historical interpretation, Cultural heritage management, Educational programming, Historical culture, Macroartifact