This session questions the ethical issues involved in working on commissioned histories for different groups or communities. Is some level of compromise always inevitable? How do we work with indigenous clients and keep a professional distance? Is it particularly hard to do commissioned work using oral histories as part of the historian’s skills? Should we only work with sympathetic employers?
Chair: Tanya Evans, Macquarie University
Speakers:
Greg Young, urban planner and editor of Paddington: a history (2019)
Pauline Curby, public historian and writer of Randwick (2010)
Public history shapes our communities’ understandings of the past. This series will explore the issues that stimulate and bedevil the work of public historians. This 3 part seminar series aims to encourage a more reflective approach to the practice of history and create conversations across a diverse cohort of practitioners. Professionals, scholars, students and those with a long-standing interest in public history all welcome.
$5 for OHNSW members