Why Are Historical Institutions Always Short on Cash?

There's a common thread that I've noticed throughout my coursework this semester, even at only a few weeks into the program. It's that just about every public history-related institution has a very limited budget.

I started thinking about why that might be the case. I believe that, for better or for worse, that our individual spending and public funding allocations reflect our priorities as a society. If that's true, then history is simply not a priority for most people in the United States. This ties in with Glassberg's idea of American culture as "historicidal", which I agree with, though with some reservation.

Then, I began thinking again. Why are we a historicidal culture? I think two of the biggest reasons are that the United States is still a very young nation, especially compared to many in Europe, whose histories extend much further back even than the first English settlement at Jamestown. There simply isn't very much history to be had. The second is, I think, how history is taught in public schools. It's generally presented as a list of dates, names and events that students are expected to memorize, regurgitate for the tests, and then probably forget about. I wholeheartedly agree with much of what is in the readings and what has been said in class about history education, particularly in that there's a lack of complete narratives to which students can relate.

Human beings connect with narratives and stories. It's been that way since before recorded history. I think that if history is presented in that way, it will be able to engage more people from a much earlier age. The fact of the matter is that when history is presented as a narrative, people engage with it, people flock to such narratives. Movies like Braveheart, Saving Private Ryan and Gettysburg were and are, very popular because they tell stories about history. The historical accuracy of the stories vary, but regardless, they still tell stories about the past and the people who lived in the past.

As aspiring public historians, we need to keep in mind that history is a collection of stories about people and events that came before us.