Public History Organizations
Students should become familiar with:
The National Council on Public History constitutes the major professional association that engages most public historians. The web site: http://www.ncph.org, contains a wealth of information concerning job opportunities, professional conferences and workshops, publications and other resources.
The H-Public listserv is a discussion group associated with
NCPH: http://www.h-net.org/~public/
The Public History Resource Center:
http://www.publichistory.org, also attempts to provide a center that
promotes networking, scholarship, information, and education in the public
history field. It grew out of a student project at the University of Maryland
and the site contains extremely informative data about the field generally.
The American Association for State and Local History, which
seceded from the American Historical Association in 1940, constitutes the
organization of choice for many local historians, historic site managers, and
history museum workers. It also publishes numerous handy how-to-do-it manuals
and can be found at:
http://www.aaslh.org.
The Utah Historical Society:
http://history.utah.gov/
Association for Living Historical Farms and Museums serves those
involved in living historical farms, agricultural museums and outdoor museums of
history and folklife. Since its founding in 1970, ALHFAM has been at the
forefront of the growth and professionalization of the use of living history
techniques in museum programs.
http://www.alhfam.org/
The Center for History and New Media at George Mason
University, directed by Roy Rosenzweig and Daniel Cohen, constitutes the
principal source of information for historians interested in digital projects
and also operates the History News Network. This excellent resource is located
at:
http://www.chnm.gmu.edu.
National Park Service. The NPS History Program is an excellent source of information for public historians. http://www.cr.nps.gov/history/index.htm
The National Coalition for History is a Washington-based,
non-profit educational organization that provides leadership in history-related
advocacy, acting as a clearinghouse for news and information concerning history
legislation and political developments. All students should read its updates
and subscribe to its RSS feed. Information concerning the organization may be
found at:
http://www.historycoalition.org.
The National Association for Interpretation was founded in 1988 from two existing organizations, the Association of Interpretive Naturalists and the Western Interpreters Association. NAI is a professional association for those involved in the interpretation of natural and cultural heritage resources in settings such as parks, zoos, museums, nature centers, aquaria, botanical gardens, and historical sites. http://www.interpnet.com/about_nai/index.shtml
The Oral History Association, established in 1966,
maintains a consciously international focus and generates scholarship concerning
the relationship between human memory and history. It publishes a journal,
Oral History Review, and operates the H-Oral listserv, and has an
informative web site at:
http://omega.dickinson.edu/organizations/oha.
The American Association of Museums was founded in 1906 to develop standards and best practices in museum work. http://www.aam-us.org/aboutaam/index.cfm
The Utah Museum Association: http://www.utahmuseums.org/
The Society of American Archivists, which also broke away
from the American Historical Association in 1936, serves as the principal North
American organization for the archival profession at:
http://www.archivists.org.