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Events
Jun. 30 | 2012 Bode-Pearson Prize
Nominations for the 2012 Bode-Pearson Prize for Outstanding Contributions to American Studies due
Jun. 30 | 2012 Mary C. Turpie Prize
Nominations for the 2012 Mary C. Turpie Prize for Outstanding Contributions to American Studies Teaching, Advising, and Program Development due
Oct. 1 | Travel Grants for Graduate Students
For submission guidelines, click here
Resources: Abstracts of American Studies Dissertations
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Greenfield, Briann G. "Old New England in the Twentieth-Century Imagination: Public Memory in Salem, Deerfield, Providence, and the Smithsonian Institution," Brown University, October 2001.
In 1957, curator Malcolm Watkins installed a 300-year-old farmhouse from Marlboro, Massachusetts in the Smithsonian’s Natural History building. The structure was so ill-fitted to its new home that museum technicians had to cut away a portion of its roof. Watkin’s determination to enshrine New England testifies to the region’s central role in American memory-making. But while many antiquarians joined Watkins in preserving and displaying remnants of New England’s past, the region’s cultural importance and historic value was open to debate. Focusing on the communities of Salem, Massachusetts; Deerfield, Massachusetts; and Providence, Rhode Island, was well as national presentations of New England’s history at the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C., this dissertation examines competing interpretations of the region’s history from 1926 through the 1960s. Recognizing the political nature of public history, this dissertation interprets the commemorative process as a struggle to define local, regional, and national identity. To this end, I have focused on the production of history, the individuals, groups, and organizations that created and disseminated New England’s past through museums, civic celebrations, and historic preservation. By treating commemorative productions as cultural texts, this dissertation affirms the power of public history, its ability to unite diverse communities, physically transform neighborhoods, legitimize class divisions, and critique social structure.
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