On February 2, 2024, I had the wonderful opportunity to conduct an interview with Public Historian Dr. Na Li. Na Li is currently an Associated Researcher at our Department of Public history. The interview is intended to introduce Na Li to you and focuses on her personal motivations and experiences. In particular, Na Li talks about her understanding of Public history, the challenges but also opportunities of her work in China and the need to think about Public history globally.
DOI: doi.org/10.17613/2ydh-bp82
Can you share a bit about your background and what motivates you to pursue a career in public history?
Oh, it’s a long story! About twenty-five years ago, I travelled around the world to search for the surviving urban landscapes in the world’s major historical cities, mostly in Asia – just happened to be, where I was born and raised. I wondered at the time if in comparing cities, especially urban preservation and planning in different places, logics and patterns would emerge that can help us better preserve the beauty of the urban environment. And so, what I see in 90% of the countries in Asia is the distinctiveness of the urban fabric is tied up, usually with our tradition. Urban heritage in Asian cities is mostly shaped by philosophies and religions. It’s less tangible. You can always associate them with the pagodas, streetscapes, and other urban features. It was in Kathmandu, Nepal, where I decided that I would go to the United States to study urban planning to better preserve a historic build environment in Asia.
I’ve studied and lived in the United States for 20 years by now. I studied urban planning here in the US, with a focus on preservation. My first book-length project took me to Kensington Market in Toronto, Canada. I was researching one of the oldest and probably the most diverse neighbourhoods in one of the most exciting cities in Canada, Kensington Market in the city of Toronto. To give you a little background. Kensington Market started as a Jewish neighbourhood at the turn of the 20th century. So, in this project I investigated the urban landscapes spanning over a century. The project takes a selective look at the four different sites of memory in the neighbourhood, including a synagogue, a bakery, a bookstore, and a community centre. As a young urban planning scholar, I started the project with a map, because we were trained to approach the city, rationally. As I was walking through these neighbourhoods, and I felt that there was something missing in this map. I refocused my project and started to explore the urban and collective memory behind the architecture. What I found out at Kensington Market is that urban landscapes should be interpreted and preserved as a kind of Public history. That’s how I started, and Public history has since become the focus of my research and teaching. So that’s a little snapshot of my story.
Are there any people who have accompanied you on this path or inspired you, whether in an academic or personal sense?
I would say at the University of Massachusetts Amerst. where I was trained, I first learned that there was a field in history that we call Public history. Professor David Glassberg who at the time directed the Public history program at UMASS was the first person that introduced me to Public history. He guided me through many projects, and he has played a critical role in my understanding of Public history. And later, when I transplant what I learned in the United States back to Asia, he worked with me through many issues from the field.
And how do you define Public history?
Back in 2018, we launched a journal “Public history” in Chinese language. At the time, I’ve already published two books on Public history and kind of know how the field was started in the United States and kind of evolved in different places. So, in that inaugural issue of the journal “Public history” I define Public history as an audience-centered history practice, which focuses on issues and demands of the public in the contemporary world. In Public history, Historians work with the public to build the past into history.
So here you see four key elements: audience centered, the contemporary world (So, it’s always relevant. It’s close and nearby), working with the public, and building the past into history. So my efforts to define Public history evolves a very different purpose. I try to define it to see through different phenomena under this big umbrella term we call Public history. So that’s why after so much like groundwork in many places, I see modern Public history as a verb, in present tense. It’s public history-ing. So, Public history making in public space is not static; It’s not fixed. It’s always unfinished. It’s always a work in progress.
Structurally, we see all the public history takes place in a dynamic and networked space. And, you know, so you have an infinite web of meanings. And so, such a space, especially nowadays in a virtual space, you say it’s fluid, it’s non-linear, it’s emergent, and sometimes it’s a little chaotic. And if you take this view, it’s a non-linear and a temporal scale, we see the line between production and consumption of history is blurring. So that’s why in my book, in my research, I talk about the public is prosuming history. It’s like they’re producing and they’re consuming history at the same time. So, it’s active or rather proactive meaning of Public history that reveals the complexity of the history making.
We see how digital media creates a different space where people can engage in transmedia storytelling and develop complex historical narratives. In that way, it’s always a moving target. That’s how I understand Public history and I call it Public history-ing.
Do we need different definition for Public history in China, or how would you describe Public history in the Chinese context?
I think this is a perfect question to segway into my recent book, Seeing History. Public history in China. You probably noticed in the title I use “seeing History” because it’s ongoing. I’m witnessing, observing history, which is happening, as I said, it’s an umbrella term. We learn the term Public history in the English context. Yet “public” and “history” both are loaded with different meanings and especially in Chinese context. That’s why, I define it to see through various public history practices; you focus on audience; you try to work with the public, and try to build the past into history. It is not a rigid definition, but does provide a framework to understand a diverse range of genres within Public history, in the Chinese context.
Which (master) narratives are dominant and influential in the politics of history or culture of remembrance when you think of Public history in China?
Let me first give you a little trajectory of how Public history has evolved in China, then I can probably better situate your question in that context. About 20 years ago, a few scholars tried to introduce public history as a field from what they had learned from the United States or other countries into China. They translated some classic public history texts, but essentially, we didn’t have an established field called public history. In the past decade, we, quite a small we. I work with a small group of scholars who also have a faith, believing that public history is worthy of scholarly attention. So we try to build up this field together.
Getting back to your question, no, we do not have the master narratives at least for now. We didn’t really have a coherent field or discipline or even subdiscipline called public history within history departments. Some neighbouring disciplines, like museum studies and archives and libraries, like in China, are trained in a completely different system. So, they are not trained as historians, and they have their own system of evaluation, and so on. In China, it is currently very difficult to define Public history, and we try to use a broad definition to understand different genres within Public history. So, I hesitate to say that we really have such a thing as master narratives.
But what narratives are important for the ordinary Chinese? Is there anything as a national sense of Public history?
I like the idea of sense of history but, I’m not sure if we, collectively, have a national sense of history. Just because we’re talking about an era or age that everything is very distributed. I’ll explain that from two fronts. First, the technology, because digital technology has played a significant role. Many Chinese people have an immediate access to a lot of information outside the academy. They don’t turn to history textbooks to learn history. And second, they start to know how to use technology to bypass the authority that controls the narratives. They can build up their own narratives in China. There may be nothing like a national sense of history, but I definitely feel the digital memory and digital sense of history or some kind of collective memory still lurks behind all those passions for understanding of the past, and for evolving a different relationship with the past.
Do family histories then play a greater role?
I have one chapter about family history in Seeing History: Public history in China. And I think family history is a critical part of public history, and in China, it has grown increasingly critical. In the chapter, I trace how we interpret family and the national history and the intersections in between and with Public history. We see that family history is at a crossroads because many people are beginning to have more opportunities to document their genealogies. And they can present, exhibit their family histories in the public space. One museum that I mentioned in my book is called “Museum of Family Letters”. It documents civilian family letters. It’s not from official archives. We have this individual who actually goes around and collects all those family letters and exhibit them in the physical space, housed within one of the prominent universities in China. So, you will see how people start to move beyond their family boundaries to share their family histories: it’s incredible.
What emerging trends or challenges do you find noteworthy in the field of Public history, in the context of China?
I always feel there’s a quite it’s exciting era to work in the Public history in China precisely because of both the challenges and opportunities. I start from opportunities because I’m an idealist. I see hopes and expectations from thriving Public history in China. Public history is booming in China. And they find different expressions like in everyday life: We see old photographs or family histories, spontaneous memorials, ritual reenactment, historic video games, oral history, to name but a few. At the most immediate level, the convergence of media technologies has significantly changed the way of how public access historical information. Here we are facing a demanding and thinking public who are yearning for a more complex understanding of the past. Depending on how you define the past, these are exciting impulses that you would never see, especially in a country where the authority is not supposed to be shared. Even in a controlled atmosphere, we still have space to engage some genuine public dialogues. And also, we have a public, who is very educated and they are yearning for a different kind of history.
The challenges and of course the fact that it’s a very controlled space. Just in the last 10 years when I was working in China, I have witnessed that space is shrinking and the government started to intervene into even the digital space. I don’t think Public history is going to thrive or sustain in a place where people cannot speak and contribute freely.
Would you then classify your work in China as activism?
No, no! There are two things that I hold, and hold dearly, and they still stay with me. One is, urban preservation. I believe you can’t have a better future without a better-preserved urban environment. Another thing is working with public to build a past that truly matters to them. I am an intellectual, more in love with my ideas, but I do not advocate for them.
Urban preservation, for example. As a preservationist, I respect people who think they want to build high-rises for a better economic return if they can give me strong argument for demolition. The same with Public history. Actually, in the last few years, some Public Historians take their stance to an extreme: in trying to representing the marginalized voices, they want to eschew that kind of rigid research process instead of saying, you take the stand first and then they start to engage in the next step. I feel Public Historians, as a scholar and professional at the same time, we need to stay with some of the basic truth in research, trying to work as a good historian first and then, a good Public Historian.
I don’t quite know to what extent Public history in China or the museum landscape in China is a male domain. But would you say your perspective as a woman had a certain impact?
Quite interestingly gender has never been an issue for me. I work with a lot of professionals and on the ground and I’ve never seen it as an issue for me. And I never feel like being a woman is an advantage or disadvantage for me or my research in China.
As it became already clear in the beginning, you are very well connected internationally and have not only worked in China, so it would be interesting for me how you incorporate global perspectives in your work.
My book, Seeing history. Public history in China, despite its geographic focus, grows out of global dialogues with public historians around the world. This is critical for me to develop my thinking and ideas about Public history in China, to better understand the historical context, the cultural implications, and the politics that are involved in these projects. Public history is going global. Public history Review just published a special issue that I edited about Public history in a Global Context (2023), to echo that sentiment.
Also, digital technology is breaking down the national boundaries. It’s incredible to see scholars from all of the world, despite their cultural and geographic just differences sometimes can face the same kind of dilemmas or issues in working with the public on specific research projects. It’s rather a luxury to talk about global, I think it’s a necessity at this point to really work collaboratively around the world. That’s why in the last ten years or so, when I was training the public history faculty in China, one significant portion of our training programs were international collaborations. I invited veteran public historians from outside of China to share their pedagogical experience and insights with the Chinese historians and educators. Thus, we can develop syllabus collectively. Then we know that we are not working alone. I truly value the global aspect of public history. Maybe that’s one of the most exciting parts of working in the field of Public history. You really have to have that kind of humility to understand others cultures and then better understand your own.
And are there any insights gained from comparing Public history practices across different countries that have significantly impacted your approach?
Yes, as I was trained in the United States, so my first book about a neighbourhood in Toronto in Canada seems a logical, if not easy, transition. Quite frankly, I was not expecting the kind of challenges that I would encounter in China. I was born and raised in China, and I understand the culture, and speak the language. However, ideas do not travel easily. So I have to constantly relearn, and unlearn part of what I have already learned in the United States. You always have to negotiate with the context.
Getting back to your question – yes. We work in different cultural contexts, and we can’t simply apply our assumptions everywhere. Sometimes the assumptions are wrong, and that can affect the design and the outcome of the project. So, I think it’s really helpful to be aware of these cultural assumptions.
Building on your experience, how do you foresee the discipline of Public history evolving in the coming years?
I’ve already alluded a little bit in my book. Public history is growing complex and is going global. So, I would say digital media is going to continually and changing the infrastructure. It’s going to change fundamentally the nature of historical research. Just take oral history as an example. Back in the old days, we do long in-depth interviews, we transcribe them, and so it’s a very standardized process. You sign the informed consent, and you archive the recordings. In the digital age, just with all those audios visual and moving images and so many platforms – It’s a big data era. We need to think about Oral history at a really, really like a different scale, but it’s going moving towards that direction. As I mentioned earlier, it’s also an era of convergence media. We need to learn how Public history evolve on the different media platforms, and to understand how this media infrastructure will help us to better comprehend public history-ing.
And as a closing note, what advice would you offer to aspiring Public Historians or students interested in Public history in a career in public history?
It is a beautiful field, and I am in love with it. I encourage young and aspiring scholars to join the field. So, there are a couple of reflections that I would like to share.
The first is that you want to cultivate that kind of habit of research in the digital age. For example, differentiating fake information from the true information. It’s a habit of research because Public history essentially breaks down to the solid research. You have to build upon that research.
Second, knowledge generated out of public history is a distributed knowledge. It is complex. Nobody will be able to possess all the knowledge than one needs for a project. You have to work with others. And I think the ability of collaborating with others is critical for young scholars to accomplish complex public history projects over a substantial amount of time.
Last, despite the technology innovations, especially Artificial Intelligence, I still value humanities in Public history. I think that’s critical. We’re working with the public, with emotions, with stories, and so we need to respect that, and bring that as a centre of our work. And I think that’s the meaning and the beauty of working as a Public Historian.
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