For all the people in my mapping medievalism seminar ...

... the BBC and the British Library have been taking a look at the history of maps. Incredibly relevant to our undertaking, particularly to Trista's paper.

For those who are not in that seminar, it is still interesting, and relevant to the work I have been undertaking with this seminar.

Further equally true, yet mutually exclusive truths

This week in Public History we looked at the issue of Repatriation in Canada and the United States. I am very much pro repatriation. The whole concept of a museum, and the preservation of historical material culture as it supposedly was in the time period, is, of course, a construct, and not the only way to celebrate heritage and culture.

Last week our speaker was James Cullingham, a documentary filmmaker who specializes in issues of social justice. The subjects he has covered in his films include Native rights in Manitoba as compared to the rights allotted to Blacks during Apartheid in South Africa, as well as how Jews and Palestinians interpret the conflict in their education systems. In class he said something along the lines of he believes that cultures should absolutely represent the culture of others, and to set up boundaries in art is ludicrous. And I wholeheartedly agree with this.

But of course, that is part of the problem that led to the need for repatriation, one culture imposing their epistemology upon that of another, and deciding how culture is to be represented.

However, James Cullingham, and the speaker that we had this week after our discussion about Repatriation, Neal Ferris, are both people who use tools that are arguably from the White Middle Class epistemology, namely documentary film and archaeology, in a culturally sensitive way. Neal Ferris holds the Lawson Chair of Archaeology, and is cross appointed to the Museum of Ontario Archaeology and the University of Western Ontario.

In an earlier post I was talking about how Public History is full of irresolvable equally true, and mutually exclusive truths. This is another one of those.

I fully support the rights of nations and cultures to define themselves, and that certainly means control over how their culture gets disseminated. This is particularly true for those cultures who have not always had that right, though really it should be true for all cultures. But the trouble is, if a culture has ultimate control over their own cultural legacies then that means that each country or nation will only be allowed to investigate cultural artefacts specific to their own history. Which in part means that there will be nothing left in the British Museum, and also will mean that somewhat arbitrary definitions based on modern culture will have to be made on the past. To whom would the history of the Norse landings in Canada belong? Canadians, though the Vikings probably did not respect the Canadian border when they were sailing about? Natives, whose ancestors may have had contact with those people, and are the only peoples who now live in those traditional locations? Scandinavians exclusively? Anyone whose country may have had contact with the Medieval Norse culture? My inclination is that it is now so old that perhaps it doesn't matter, but that is not a valid argument when discussing the heritage of several cultures, and so it becomes dangerous to apply that haphazardly to the ones that are not as linked to current politics.

An extreme, one that practically is unlikely to come to fruition, but should be considered nonetheless, is the danger of cultural segregation. Another extreme would be where people are expected to have cultural sensitivity without having any exterior cultural understanding, as a true knowledge of a culture is limited to the confines of that culture.

This issue is also related to what was said in earlier classes about the accuracy of living history. Who gets to play a settler, if the ethnicity of the modern employee does not match the ethnicity of the original historical persona. This is very much related to who gets to decide how the culture is represented. And it is interesting, because while I fall on the side of repatriation I think, with some cultural sensitivity attached to the interpretation, that living history should make an effort to be accurate in their portrayals, but that ultimately the employees should be more representative of the modern culture that they are serving, rather than the historical culture they are representing.

And I guess that is what guides my views on repatriation, that I think history should serve our current communities rather than the other way around. Still, that does not mean that it should be manipulated any way one wants. And representation of a culture through art is not the same as the preservation of heritage through material culture, though they are very closely linked. And so, it is another issue that is unresolvable, but is made better by an awareness of the inherent problems. Who ultimately gets to represent a culture, and are the representations from outside of that culture invalid, or do they also bring something to the discussion?

(Wholly overuse of the word culture Batman).

How to Train your Historically Minded Movie Goer

Don't you hate going to the movies with those people who pick at the movie until it is dead? There are the people who read the book and then saw the movie, and then complain about how much the movie is unlike the book, even if it was a really good movie. Then, of course, there is taking an historian to any movie. It is there mission to find the flaws in the history, and even if the story is really good and really moving dismiss the whole thing as a-historical.

I am one of these people. Well, not really. Actually sometimes I am alarmed as an historian how many historical inaccuracies I miss. But I think it sort of depends how you approach your criticisms. If you are out to be disappointed, you might be. If you are willing to dismiss the whole because of some details, then the movie probably wasn't going to appeal to you anyway. But sometimes its fun. It's like the people who sit down to their favourite films to find all the continuity errors. It's fun to know things. For many historians, it can be fun to find the historical flaws. My colleague Catherine Caughell has recently put up several blog posts about historical fiction novels. I take much the same approach to historically minded films; they were always some of my favourites, and by getting me interested, they prompted me to learn more. I grew up on Westerns, period pieces, and war movies, and always watched any version of Robin Hood I could get my hands on.

So, as a student of the Medieval Norse and Public History I turn now to the recent Dreamworks picture How to Train your Dragon, not because I expected it to be historical, nor because I would have wanted it to be, but because it is interesting to think about the reasons the filmmakers chose to utilize certain aspects of the history. Don't worry, I know it has dragons in it, I know it is fantasy for children. Still ...

Also, slight spoiler alert for people who read on.

It is easy to see why all the Vikings in the village wear horned hats. That is the clearest identifier of Viking. I mean, even Hagar the Horrible wears a horned hat. In the film Hiccup's father gives him a horned helmet, which essentially means he has achieved 'Vikingness.' The trouble is, despite its clear identification with Vikings, there is no evidence that 'Vikings' ever wore anything like it. That being said, we would no doubt be disappointed if the Vikings did not have horned helmets. The filmmakers chose that symbol because it conveys a lot of information about who we imagine these people are, tapping into a popular conception we already have, without the film having to explain it.

The use of runes was a nice touch. And because the characters were speaking English you could actually sort of see the characters making the correct English sounds. Look at 'Night Fury' especially when it is written down. The thing about runes though is that they are characters that have a lot of straight lines for the specific reason that that makes them easier to carve. There is not much evidence of writing in books the way we understand it. There are a few codexes written in runes, though the concept of writing in this way really comes after the introduction of Christianity, not during the time of Thor or Odin, which it is suggested is the time of this movie. The sagas are written down using Latin letters, and not until Christianity has been established in Scandinavia for a century or two. But you can see why the filmmakers chose to do it this way. The idea of a secret and personal knowledge that Hiccup discovers for himself would be conveyed through a book. We understand the nature of a manual, or textbook, and that is easy to relate to, especially for children who are supposed to learn things this way. It is understandable that the students who are trying to learn about dragons would learn in this way. The use of runes makes the book other, and kind of exciting, communicating again that idea of 'Vikingness.'

The whole movie is peppered with some Scandinavian-isms. When Hiccup brings his dragon some fish he mentions that amongst them there is some Icelandic cod. Why not, as they way that they speak is modern, so their frame of reference for fish names may as well be modern. Stoick, Hiccups father, routinely uses THor and Odin as an expletive, just like one would say oh God. This certainly adds to the character, though the film shies away from any statement about religion, as you would expect of a children's film. The village itself is composed of a combination of individual houses, and great halls, representing many Scandinavian villages and none at the same time. But a house is understandable to a modern audience, a place to come home after school. And a great hall can be rather magnificent looking, and might as well be used as a gathering place, so even if it is not a place that after spending the day they fold up the tables and chairs at night and sleep, it is an important part of this larger concept of village.

But of course, there are dragons ... and an arena, and a great number of other monsters. So don't worry, I don't take myself overly seriously. But what we do have here is a selective use of poplar conceptions of an historical period that have been used strategically to create a foreign yet familiar aesthetic in which this fantastic story can take place. I feel that the filmmakers have done this well. It also really helps that it is a really good story with very interesting characters and a very visually pleasing movie.

All in all, I really liked it. And of course, any excuse I can get to 'geek out' and annoy people with my knowledge in a movie theatre, all the better.

And of course, the movie is based on a book.

I'm not very good at math ... that's why I like history

My colleague Jordan Goldstein wrote a blog post earlier this year about how Canadians often define themselves in terms of how they are different from their American colleagues. How groups view themselves is a common theme in Public History, because if historians want to know what kind of image of history we can present to the public, and what kind of images the public will except, we should understand first how a culture sees itself. There are the positive identifiers, the thing that a group is and does, but there are also the negative identifiers, what the group is not or doesn't do that others might. In the case of Canadians, that seems to be Americans more so than any other group that we have decided we are not (mostly because the case is not always that obvious).

My colleague Braden Murray made the observation much earlier in the year that many of the conversations had by Grad students in the History department eventually turn into a discussion of Canadian identity. Partly that is because most of us are Canadian historians, and even more so because we all come from different areas of both Canada and the United States. This was especially true at the beginning when we were first meeting each other, and when we were first trying to explain how we were a cohesive group to our American colleague (sorry Sara). But maybe that is one of the positive identifiers of the group known as History grad students, a desire to define our shared cultural heritage.

What also makes us a group, however, is our negative identifiers. Mostly, I find that for Grad students in history, and probably in many other Arts programs as well, the group that we define ourselves against is Math. It is a suitable excuse, when you get a simple math problem wrong, to say that I am a history major. Marking especially is always described in relation to the math department. The argument is that in Math you can get 100% because it is either right or wrong, but in History it is more subjective. You can't get 100%, but the likelihood of getting less than 60% is also greatly minimized. It seems everything that we are is best understood in relationship to Math. In many ways this is a fallacy, particularly for the economic historians, but it is an easy means of self-identification. I my personal experience I wasn't bad at math, but it was the only class that made me physically squirm in my chair. And my path through University has been chosen in a way where I can take the least amount of math possible ... since I am, after all, a history major.

Thrilling, yet disturbing, discoveries in the library.

If you have seen other entries from my blog, you will have seen this image before:



I am using it in my paper that I am writing for the Mapping Medievalism Seminar in the Visual Arts Department. Also, because it represents early American scholarship on the topic of the Norse in America, I thought it should be included in the exhibit that the seminar is putting on in September.

It is a lecture that was given in the late 1830s, almost corresponding with the World Fair in Chicago. It was written and delivered by Asahel Davies. This version is actually the 16th edition, and was published in 1846.

When looking through the libraries catalogue I came upon this title, though I didn't actually see the date. I thought it would be perfect. When I came to realize that it was actually a copy from the first half of the nineteenth century, and that I was going to be allowed to take it out of the library, I was surprised, excited, and a little disturbed.

When I brought it up to circulation the librarian gave me a sideways glance. I don't think anyone has checked this out in at least ten years, and he was clearly not quite certain it should go out. He couldn't really say no. I said to him 'I can't believe I can take this.' He said 'yeah ...' in a trail-y sort of a way, and furrowed his brow.

Don't worry, I took very good care of it. At least I tried to, I very carefully took a picture of the front of the pamphlet, which may have crossed the line librarian-wise, but I think that was okay.

Of course, amongst people who have worked with artifacts, or who are budding librarians, historians or archivists, I have got a very consistent reaction of 'they let you take that out of the library,' to which I usually respond, 'I know, right!' It is now in the hands of Prof. Brush of the Visual Arts department. The thing was, I didn't want to actually return it because I wanted it for our exhibit. I was pretty sure that once it gets back into the hands of librarians it may become locked into the vaults of the archives; accessible, but not available to take home, or handled without the proper supervision. Not at all convenient for my purposes.

In the end, this is the paradox that most librarians, museum experts, and historians find themselves in: we want the artifacts to be properly cared for, and protected ... but not until we have had a go at them.

My First Attempts at Label Writing

For the Seminar 'Mapping Medievalism at the Canadian Frontier' I have been looking at several texts which I think should be included in the Exhibit at the end of the Seminar. I have included here the images I took of the four texts I chose, and the four labels that I wrote. As you may have been able to deduce from my short writing for the public piece I am not very good at condensing my ideas. I found the label writing to be particularly hard. Here is the first draft of these four labels, I welcome any feedback.



Asahel Davis

Antiquities of America, The First Inhabitants of Central America, and the Discovery of New England, By the Northmen, Five Hundred Years Before Columbus, with Important Additions, 1846

And is it not a laudable curiosity that leads one to ascertain what white men first trod regions in which the modest wild flower wasted its sweetness on the desert air?

This is the sixteenth edition of this lecture to be printed, showing the work’s immense popularity. The first printings were in 1838-39. At the time that this lecture was circulating the tales of the Norse voyages were only starting to be brought to the attention of the scholarly community in America.

Davis relies on the work of The Royal Society of Antiquarians, who produced the Antiquitates Americanae in Danish in 1837. That was the first time the Vinland sagas, the sagas about Norse landings in Greenland and North America, had been translated and printed for the public. Davis argues, based on the content of the sagas, that the history of the Norsemen in this continent should be made a part of the larger scholarly understanding of the Antiquities of America.

Megan Arnott MA Public History 2010

Collection of the D.B. Weldon Library
The University of Western Ontario



Farley Mowat

Westviking: The Ancient Norse in Greenland and North America, 1965

Farley Mowat is among the great literary nation builders of Canada. His focus is the Canadian North, and the relationship of Canadians to the land, and with each other within the context of the land. His use of the medieval European connection in reconstructing the Canadian North is given weight because of the clout Mowat has as a Canadian author.

The Norse voyages to Canada is a theme that is repeated in many of his works, including The Curse of the Viking Grave (1966), ‘The Iron Men’ in The Snow Walker (1975), and in The Farfarers: Before the Norse (1998). The latter and this work are both scholarly texts that discuss European arrival in Canada in the context of evidence and anthropology.

There is a conflict that occurs when Mowat tries to reconstruct the Norse landings in the context of Canadian history. The existence of an ancient, almost mythical European presence helps to naturalize the existence of Europeans in Canada. However, the Norse were not themselves native to the land, so their arrival can be seen as part of the trend of later European imperialism. This is a conflict that is not resolved.

Megan Arnott MA Public History 2010

Collection of the D.B. Weldon Library
The University of Western Ontario



Marie A. Brown Shipley

The Icelandic Discoverers of America or Honor to Whom Honor is Due, 1887

In the nineteenth century, and before the discovery of the Norse settlement at L’Anse aux Meadows, there were many texts written defending the idea that the Norse were here before Christopher Columbus. Some were very scholarly examinations of the sagas and the science of sailing. Some were also emotional pleas to include the Norsemen in the national myth. This is strictly the latter.

Marie Shipley’s work relies heavily on the scholarship of others to establish the truth of the sagas. Most of the text is allotted to how the Catholic Church and Spain are the root of all evil in modern American life, and how if we accept Christopher Columbus as the discoverer of America we are accepting the overlordship and tyranny of the Catholic Church through Spain.

On the front cover, the quote from Bayard Taylor,
From shores where Thorfinn set thy banner/ Their latest children seek thee now,
accompanied by an image of a banner with an eagle on it, is supposed to both show how Americans are directly the inheritors of the Norse and provoke them to restore the Norse to their place of glory. This will in turn restore glory and freedom to the American people.

Megan Arnott MA Public History 2010

Collection of the D.B. Weldon Library
The University of Western Ontario



Robert McGhee


Canada Rediscovered, 1991

Robert McGhee plays on the word ‘discovery,’ because the Europeans, of course, did not ‘discover’ Canada. This is why Canada is ‘rediscovered.’

McGhee places the arrival of different waves of migration to North America into a global context of settlement. He also discusses our own perceptions of Canada’s ‘discovery.’ It is significant that this work was published in 1991, one year before the five hundredth anniversary of the ‘discovery’ of Christopher Columbus.

The helmet, though not an artefact found on Canadian soil, was chosen for the cover because it represents the Old Norse culture. The Norse are the first Europeans archaeologists can prove were here, completing McGhee’s circle of the globe by man. The Norsemen challenge the position of Columbus in the public’s imagination as the first European to arrive in North America. Therefore, in the year when the public expects to see Columbus, the Norsemen have been represented on purpose to make audiences re-evaluate their perception of the ‘discovery’ of Canada.

Megan Arnott MA Public History 2010

Collection of the D.B. Weldon Library
The University of Western Ontario

The Vinland Loop

I am stuck in something I like to call the Vinland Loop.

I have noticed in our history program that many people's particular historical interests have emerged. I think I can safely give myself the nickname of Viking Girl. It does seem a little ingenuous to give yourself your own nickname, but I am going to go for it.

Vinland is a fascinating topic. Sagas and literature give you just enough to tantalize you with the prospect of locating it in North America, but stop short of allowing you to ever prove that you have found the location. Not only that, Vikings and the Norse are a very exciting, somewhat romantic topic.

It gives us so many things to talk about, discuss and debate, that so much has been written about it. It continues to pose academic problems, not least of which is when we realize we are clearly so interested in who were the first Europeans to arrive here, and what that means for us as a people.

As I have said before, Vinland and the Viking presence in, well, Canada really, is one of the reasons I decided to specialize in Vikings; they covered so much that I was interested in, including Medieval History and Canadian History.

But I find myself in a Vinland loop. I am interested in Vikings in part because of Vinland (the decision to study certain aspects of history is usually some sort of personal connection) so I write about it or do projects about it. It is easy to see how so much nationalistic and romantic literature is written about it. And then when I try to think about what I know that will be relevant for Canadians, I am drawn back to Vinland. While I study generally, as a subject, Vikings, I keep writing about Vinland and doing projects about Vinland because it is what will be interesting to the public I am hoping to represent. They too are most likely to be drawn in by showing them their personal connection.

It's not a problem really. The very obvious solution would be, don't. I certainly don't find it to be a problem. But it does appear that I am working very hard to pigeon hole myself into one particular subject, though I do have wide interests.

So in summary, look out for more about Vinland from me in the future. I am sure it is forthcoming.