Community History 2024 is now underway! This past March, the nine organizations in the cohort met twice at the Twin Rivers Branch Library in West Windsor to learn all about community-engaged public history.
At the first workshop, Lynne Calamia explored three questions, drawing on her experiences as Executive Director of the Roebling Museum:
- What is history?
- What is public history?
- What is community history?
The cohort found that there are quite a few distinctions between the three! As Lynne explained, one of the core tenets of community history is shared authority, or engaging community members as equal partners in creating public history projects from their beginning stages. By sharing authority, community members and project teams work together to establish shared goals a create a collective vision for the project.
Past Participant Roundtable: Joy Robinson (left), Nicole Wines, Patricia Lindsay-Harvey, and Mika Fields (right)
The session was held at Twin Rivers Branch Library
At the second workshop, we were thrilled to be joined by previous program participants who provided the cohort with methods and models for community history projects. Thank you to Nicole Wines from Raíces Cultural Center, Joy Robinson from Piscataway Public Library, and Mika Fields and Patricia Lindsay-Harvey from Willingboro CDC for your thoughtful reflections and advice!
While organizations will not begin developing their project plans until the summer, some have begun brainstorming. Southern Ocean Chamber Association anticipates exploring the business history of Long Beach Island while gathering input from current-day business owners. Lawnside Historical Society hopes to understand how the construction of the New Jersey Turnpike affected the Lawnside community and the town’s landscape. Glen Rock Historical and Preservation Society is considering the history of integration and houses of worship in Glen Rock.
Other organizations are interested in conducting oral history projects to give voice to people who have been excluded from or overlooked by traditional historical narratives. Next session, they will receive introductory oral history training from Cristóbal Espinoza-Wulach of the Middlesex College “Our Memory, Our Community” oral history project. In the months beyond, they will learn how to incorporate accessibility into their projects, with the help of Nicole Belolan Consulting, and continue to hear from organizations doing important community history work in New Jersey.
We’ll report back soon!
