Volume 2, Issue 1 -

This essay introduces the special section on undergraduate public history teaching. It explores its various opportunities, its challenges and some options for instructors to design their courses. In addition to presenting the six contributions of this special section, the author proposes some broader reflections on how undergraduate public history teaching can potentially change the ways history is taught but also researched and practiced in universities.

This paper seeks to discuss some challenges and reflections on teaching a public history class for the first time, in a country with little familiarity with public history as a field, and with limited literature in Spanish. This experience presents some decisions on how to teach public history, how undergraduate students got involved in public history as a practice, and some considerations on historians and public history.

In many ways, teaching public history through real-world projects is a panacea. After all, a properly trained graduate of a public history program should be able to leave the theoretical world of the university and shift confidently into the exigencies of professional practice. But many educators naturally shy away from this approach because it is fraught with potential disasters – the looming threat of the unknown that frustrates students, educators, and partners alike. Flexibility and adaptability are keys to developing successful real-world public history projects. Accepting or even welcoming the unanticipated provides valuable teaching moments and a sense of reality that is difficult to duplicate in the classroom. Moreover, crafting a flexible but ultimately successful student project requires identifying the right partner or client while tempering expectations with a thoughtful and realistic scope of work.

This article reflects on the process of building and teaching a course in digital public history for Bachelor students at the University of Luxembourg. The heart of the program was the hands-on, experimental approach. The article describes the organization of the course and presents some of the strategies followed to lead the students through a more holistic and playful approach. The experience shows that the learning by doing motto can be an effective path for teaching public history and especially digital public history, as the digital element opens space for more experimentation.

In 2016–17 and in 2018–19, undergraduate students and faculty at Huron University College in London, Canada, and at Bath Spa University in the UK collaborated on an innovative community-based research project: Phantoms of the Past: Slavery and Resistance, History and Memory in the Atlantic World. Our paper outlines the structure of the project, highlights student research, and argues that the Phantoms undergraduate student researchers helped to create an innovative and important body of work on transatlantic Public History and local commemorative practice.

The Isikhumbuzo Applied History Unit (IAHU) of Rhodes University History Department specializes in innovative methodologies for bringing historical information closer to non-academic audiences. The National Research Foundation of South Africa funds the research work conducted by Isikhumbuzo Applied History Unit. This article shares insights from a reflective discussion that took place February 4, 2019 at Rhodes University. The team reflects on the challenges of doing Public History work in South Africa, particularly drawing attention to the issues surrounding academics and the public when it comes to engaging in research and storytelling exercises that unearth untold stories. Experimenting with creative arts such as drama and dance as strategies that can improve public participation in historical work, the team discusses how they are bridging the gap between the public, artists, and academics. The views expressed in this roundtable discussion contribute to the reflexive nature of the methodology employed by the Isikhumbuzo Applied History Unit.

This article traces the origins and development of public history in Italy, a field not anymore without this name today. Public history in Italy has its roots in historical institutions born in the nineteenth century and in the post WW2 first Italian Republic. The concept of “public use of history” (1993), the important role played by memory issues in post-war society, local and national identity issues, the birth of public archaeology (2015) before public history, the emergence of history festivals in the new millennium are all important moments shaping the history of the field and described in this essay. The foundation of the “Italian Association of Public History” (AIPH) in 2016/2017, and the promotion of an Italian Public History Manifesto (2018) together with the creation of Public History masters in universities, are all concrete signs of a vital development of the field in the Peninsula.