Revisionist Histories-A post-graduate workshop
Professor Marnie Hughes-Warrington

Revision/Revisionism is the reinterpretation of orthodox views on evidence, motivations, and decision-making processes surrounding a historical event - it is the lifeblood of historical scholarship. Why then is it so little understood?

Professor Marnie Hughes-Warrington in her 2013 book Revisionist Histories argues that the process is underexplored and questions the methods that have been used to explain it.

Incorporating diverse and controversial case studies (including the French Revolution, Holocaust Denial and European settlers’ contact with Native Americans and Indigenous Australians), and using a wide range of media (from written histories to websites, wall murals and vandalised books), Revisionist Histories offers both a detailed account of the development of revisionism and a new, more spatial vision of historiography.

This workshop will be facilitated by Dr Alexander Cook from the History program in the College of Arts and Social Sciences.

The aim of this workshop is to explore the role of revision in history making. Every day, histories are revised, updated, cached, retracted and either pulped or taken down. Most of the time those changes attract little comment, or only limited debate amongst topic specialists. Sometimes, though, the appearance of histories—or changes to them—trigger bitter public disputes, recriminations and even acts of violence.

Participants in the workshop are asked to select a reading stream, and to think about the connection of the ideas they encounter to their own research, and in scholarly as well as public expressions of history.

Background reading for all participants
Participants were asked to read:
1. Hughes-Warrington, M., Revisionist Histories, Abingdon: Routledge, 2013, INTRODUCTION,
2. Friedman, M. P., and Kenny, P., Partisan Histories, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005, INTRODUCTION
3. ‘Historical Revisionism’ and ‘Historical Revisionism (negationism)’ entries in Wikipedia

And to pursue one of the following reading streams: (Participants to read either A, B or C)
A. Historical Revision and the Built Environment
Read Revisionist Histories CHAPTER TWO, and
• Dubin, S. C., Displays of Power: Controversy in the American Museum from the Enola Gay to Sensation!, New York: NY University Press, 2001 CHAPTER ONE

OR

B. Historical Revision and the Internet
Read Revisionist Histories CHAPTER FOUR, and
• Darnell, S., Measuring Holocaust Denial in the United States, available at: hks.harvard.edu/ocpa/pdf/HolocaustDenialPAE.pdf

OR

C. Historical Revision and Truth and Reconciliation Commissions
Read Revisionist Histories, CHAPTER FIVE and
• Bevernage, B., History, Memory and State-Sponsored Violence, Abingdon: Routledge, 2012. CHAPTER TWO