This is just a splendid idea:
They’re looking for entries on the following themes:
* Bad presentations of history - This is the easy one. Review bad historical movies, books and teevee. How anachronistic are those uniforms? How improbable is that alternate history novel? Did kindly frontier doctors really talk like that?
* Bad uses of history - When pundits, politicians, and talking heads get hold of history they often twist it beyond all recognition or justification. Tell us about the mangaled metaphors, unjustified parallels, or outright lies you find in the public sphere.
* Historians behaving badly - Historians manage their share of embarassing talking head appearances, plagiarism scandals, and corporate sell-outs. We don’t want mere unpleasant gossip. Contributions in this category should be of historians behaving badly in their professional capacity as historians.
The first issue will be at archy, 1 March.
………..
Which reminds me that History Carnival #2 is due in the next week or so: send submissions to Ralph Luker, the host (ralphluker AT mindspring DOT com).
5 comments on “Bad History”
Hmm . . . when I saw this I was overcome by the thought ‘Judge not, lest ye shall be judged’. I’m going to be halfway along a branch myself in a few months (as ‘academic consultant’ on a radio series) and the last thing that I want is any new enemies to add to the mercifully short existing list.
So my views on XXXXX XXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXX XXXX, the XXXXXX of XXXX, and the way the XXXXXX used XXXXX an an excuse for XXXXX, are going to remain muzzled in a monumental act of self-censorship.
On the other hand, any lackwit who comes out with any variation on the phrase ‘crime has risen because police figures say it has’ can watch out. That ground is _easy_.
I just dropped by to announce Bad History and beg for a plug, but I see you beat me to it. I view Bad History as a compliment History Carnival rather than competition. In any case, I’d like to extend an invitation to you and all of your readers to participate.
John McKay
proprietor of Bad History
I’ve just been surveying film and TV adaptations of Shakespeare’s history plays for the British Film Institute - do they count?
The 1995 Richard III with Ian McKellen is probably the most extreme example, taking what was already a highly contentious narrative and transplanting it into an imaginary 1930s Fascist Britain, though since the filmmakers knew exactly what they were doing it seems a trifle unfair to slam the end result as Bad History.
Michael, the only way to find out will be to write it (if you haven’t already) and then send the link to the host to decide. I think a discussion of the history plays, and the films of them, could make an interesting contribution.
And now I have a question for people who know about showbiz. It seems that everyone now calls the actor Sir Ian *McKellen*. But for most of my life I thought it was *McKellern*. So was I wrong, or has he changed his name recently, or what?
Definitely McKellen (his website should settle this!)
I suspect you might have fused the name with Peter Skellern or some such.