Seeing History: Public History in China

By Na Li and Li Na

Book Overview

When public history was imported from the United States to China around the turn of the twenty-first century, it was introduced as a sub-field within history, and has developed along that path ever since. Professional historians in China, even some forward-looking ones, see public history as merely presenting a change in the patterns of participation in history-making. This book offers a sharply different view.

It contends, essentially, that public history represents more than a research domain within history or within any existing discipline, nor does it fit into any established narratives, but rather, a fundamental change of the entire process of history-making in China. In this process, the public is prosuming history. Public history makes obsolete the old structure for building and acquiring historical knowledge: it challenges the old assumptions, supersedes the rigid academic hierarchy, and stirs the imaginations of the multitudes. With an assemblage of case studies, this work makes a case for a system view of public history making, or public history(ing), and launches a concept, complex public history, i.e. public history(ing) as complex adaptive systems.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 3112214803
• ISBN13: 9783112214800
• Release Date: June 2025
• Publisher: de Gruyter Oldenbourg
• Length: 300 Pages
• Weight: 1.33 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 6.1" x 9.1"