The dynamic continuities of history
Memory isn’t about the past, it’s about the process of shaping a continuity.” — Shelley Armitage, in Walking the Llano: A Texas Memoir of Place
Most historians know that what they do is as much about the present as it is about the past. We are not merely recalling things that happened. Memory, whether it be personal or collective, always has to do with the present. Historical thinking, as I understand it, involves connecting our present to a continuity that has been going on for millennia.
The ground we stand upon has a past, but we stand on it in the present looking toward the days and years yet to come. History links the places we inhabit in the dynamic continuities of who we have been, who we are, and who we may become.
[Daily post 040 of 260 in my year-long challenge.] ♨
