The Evidence of History

History is always innocently churning out its evidence: events large and small, births and deaths, disasters and triumphs. People take up these pieces of the past for a variety of reasons and shape commemorative acts around them. This decisive gathering of evidence is driven by what I call the commemorative urge, a desire to repackage the past for use in the present and preservation for the future. Commemoration draws a circle around a given day, event, action, and/or actor. “I want to look at this,” the commemorator is saying. “I want to look at this now, here, today.” And unless the commemorative act is solitary, such as visiting the grave of a loved one to serve an individual need, the commemorator is drawing others into the commemorative circle, people who might or might not share an interest in this selection of evidence. “This is important,” is the claim being made. “Let's look at this together.” Also, in some acts of commemoration, there is one more statement, and an important one, addressed to the population at large. “Look at us,” some public commemorators state. “Notice what we’re doing here. This is something we care about. You should care about this too.”