Revisionist Histories

161 Pages·2013·2.686 MB·English

by  Marnie Hughes-Warrington

Revisionist Histories
‘Marnie Hughes-Warrington once again challenges conventional and hierarchical
ways of conceptualizing historical practices. This book asks thought provoking
questions about what is seen to count as legitimate history, what is seen to
constitute a legitimate act of historical revisionism, and the ways in which
audiences make their own meanings from their encounters with historically
focused works. This is an important book for anyone who wishes to think
about historical practices and revisionism anew.’
Mark Donnelly, St. Mary’s University College, UK
Revisionandrevisionismaregenerallyseenasstandardpartsofhistoricalpractice,
yet they are underexplored within the growing literature on historiography.
In this accessibly written volume, Marnie Hughes-Warrington discusses this
paucity of work on revision in history theory and raises ethical questions about
linear models and spatial metaphors that have been used to explain it.
Revisionist Histories emphasises the role of the authors and audiences of
histories alike as the writers and rewriters of history. Through study of digital
environments, graphic novels and reader-annotated texts, this book shows that
the‘sides’ofhistorycannotbedisentangledfromoneanother,andthattheyare
subject to flux and even destruction over time.
Incorporating diverse and controversial case studies, including the French
Revolution, Holocaust denial and European settlers’ contact with Native
Americans and Indigenous Australians, Revisionist Histories offers both a
detailed account of the development of revisionism and a new, more spatial
vision of historiography. It is an essential text for students of historiography.
Marnie Hughes-Warrington is Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academic) at the
AustralianNationalUniversity.Sheistheauthoroffivebooks,includingHistory
Goes to the Movies (2007), The History on Film Reader (2008) and Fifty Key
Thinkers on History (2000, 2008).
This page intentionally left blank
Revisionist Histories
Marnie Hughes-Warrington
Firstpublished2013
byRoutledge
2ParkSquare,MiltonPark,Abingdon,OxonOX144RN
SimultaneouslypublishedintheUSAandCanada
byRoutledge
711ThirdAvenue,NewYork,NY10017
RoutledgeisanimprintoftheTaylor&FrancisGroup,aninformabusiness
©2013MarnieHughes-Warrington
TherightofMarnieHughes-Warringtontobeidentifiedas
authorofthisworkhasbeenassertedbyherinaccordancewithsections
77and78oftheCopyright,DesignsandPatentsAct1988.
Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthisbookmaybereprintedorreproduced
orutilisedinanyformorbyanyelectronic,mechanical,orothermeans,
nowknownorhereafterinvented,includingphotocopyingandrecording,
orinanyinformationstorageorretrievalsystem,withoutpermissionin
writingfromthepublishers.
Trademarknotice:Productorcorporatenamesmaybetrademarksor
registeredtrademarks,andareusedonlyforidentificationand
explanationwithoutintenttoinfringe.
BritishLibraryCataloguinginPublicationData
AcataloguerecordforthisbookisavailablefromtheBritishLibrary
LibraryofCongressCataloginginPublicationData
Hughes-Warrington,Marnie.
Revisionisthistories/MarnieHughes-Warrington.
pagescm.
Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex.
1.Historiography.2.History–Philosophy.I.Title.
D13.H7522013
907.2–dc23
2012050043
ISBN:978-0-415-56078-8(hbk)
ISBN:978-0-415-56079-5(pbk)
ISBN:978-0-203-76980-5(ebk)
TypesetinSabon
byTaylor&FrancisBooks
I dedicate this book to Alice, not only because she
shares my love of a good argument, but also because
she was at my side as I wrote it.
This page intentionally left blank
Contents
List of figures viii
List of tables ix
Acknowledgements x
Introduction: Revision in history 1
1 Lines 8
2 Spaces 22
3 Boundaries 38
4 Webs 57
5 Taking sides 77
6 Rewriting history 89
Conclusion: Rethinking history 114
Bibliography 123
Index 138
fi
List of gures
1.1 Representation of Hegel’s notion of the dialectic 9
3.1 Divis Street murals, 2 May 2011 by Ardfern 42
3.2 Martha Kuhlman’s decoding of In the Shadow of No Towers
broadsheet nine 47
3.3 Maus 1, ‘Mouse Trap’, p. 137 48
3.4 Maus 1, ‘Mouse Trap’, p. 161 49
3.5 Maus 1, ‘Prisoner on the Hell Planet’, p. 101 49
3.6 Heru, Son of Ausar 51
3.7 Diop’s representation of a painting from the tomb of Rameses III 51
3.8 Diop’s connection between Senegalese and Egyptian girls 52
4.1 Phases of activity for Holocaust denial groups, based on Shermer
and Grobman, Denying History, p. 102 63
4.2 Unique visitor estimates for the Institute for Historical Revision
website (www.ihr.org), from Compete.com 63
4.3 Tiered IT architecture: three-tier example 65
6.1 Readers reorder G. W. F. Hegel’s The Philosophy of History
(1956) 95
6.2 ‘The Historian’ in Beverley Southgate’s History: What and Why?
(1996) 96
6.3 ‘The Reader of History’ in Beverley Southgate’s History:
What and Why? (1996) 98
6.4 ‘Revising History’ in Beverley Southgate’s History: What
and Why? (1996) 98
6.5 Creating a palimpsest in Ian Clark’s The Post-Cold War Order
(2001) 99
6.6 Providing indexes for other readers of Russel Ward’s Concise
History of Australia (1992) and Mary Fulbrook’s A Concise
History of Germany (1990) 100
6.7 Redrawing Arthur Marwick’s The Nature of History (1989) 102
6.8 Marking Gabrieli’s Arab Historians of the Crusades with nail
polish (1969) 103
6.9 Overwriting Bendet Hershkovitch’s testimony in Marrus’s
The Nazi Holocaust (1989) 104
6.10 Personalising Taylor’s Bismarck (1955) 105
6.11 Sealing off Marrus’s The Nazi Holocaust (1989) 106
List of tables
4.1 Opportunities for Volunteering, the Committee for Open Debate
on the Holocaust (CODOH) 70
5.1 Modern genocides 82
5.2 Top ten villainous rulers 83
5.3 Top nine most evil women in history 83