Last spring at Williams, I took a class for my history major in which we studied historiography, or the study of how people remember history. We spent the semester looking at museums, memorials, monuments, and other media that influence how history is remembered. With my internship at the New York Historical Society, I now have the opportunity to witness and participate in the process of shaping historical memory. I will be helping to complete an exhibit on Grant and Lee and doing preliminary research on an exhibit about Latinos in New York. My role as researcher will closely parallel the task of writing a paper at school, calling upon the historical research and writing skills I have developed at Williams. At the same time, I will cater to a broader and more diverse audience, have access to a far wider pool of primary resources, and be required to focus more specifically and do more detective work in my research. Despite these differences, the questions I will encounter at my internship are central to the study of history at Williams or in a workplace—questions about why and how to study history, where to find reliable sources, and what new insights we have to offer.

In addition, I will see how curators balance what the audience ought to know with what they might find interesting, how they provide appropriate depth and complexity without boring or confusing the audience, and how they determine what to tell the audience versus what to let them interpret or infer. I may even get to see how visitors actually react to and interact with the exhibit, which will provide me with valuable information about how the public relates to the past and what these slices of history mean to different people. Ultimately, the medium will be very different from what I am used to, but the product is an example of a practical application of the historical analysis I have been practicing at Williams.
~ Sophie Glickstein

Website:

https://www.nyhistory.org/web/

Students:

Sophie Glickstein ‘