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 webslinky: reclaiming histories
This week, history rewritten. If there’s one thing that internet research teaches you it’s that history is subjective, largely written by the victors. Furthermore, over the last few years, peoples’ interest in history has shifted away from the lives of kings and queens to our own social history. And why not? It feels more alive and it’s ours. With this sea change, secret and previously unrepresented parties have found voice with the help of the internet, and this is (with a few reservations) a good thing.Open2.net’s Why Do Historians Disagree? section offers a good overview of why historians argue over matters of the past, touching on political slant and ideology, and why every story has an angle that might not have been fully explored yet. We are of course in the last week of Black History Month, but the site is an all year round resource; a one-stop shop of cultural events taking place around the country which draws on the sort of experience and social history rarely found in schoolbooks. Blackhistory.com is an interesting American counterpoint that will no doubt now be focusing on the death of Rosa Parks earlier this week. There’s also an ever-expanding section of stories submitted by the public, which is building into a healthy archive touching on matters as diverse as food and politics. Of course, conspiracy theories abound on the web, although the fundamental problem with most is the belief that those above are actually smart enough to weave a credible conspiracy to hoodwink us all. Information Clearing House is one of the less hysterical alternative news sites, largely interested (for obvious reasons) in Middle Eastern politics and the history thereof. They’re big fans of Chomsky, as you might imagine. Secret histories are a constant fascination, and the Freemasons offer much fascination with their covert organisation and alleged mysticism. This Freemasons site goes so far as to claim that Washington DC is laid out in Masonic symbols, proving that history can possibly be too subjective - even in the uncensored world of the internet.
Richad Hector-Jones
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related info
 useful linksblack history month www.blackhistory.com information clearing house www.chomsky.info freedom domain: freemasons
note: The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
see also
 webslinky #057cultural locators  webslinky #056i-cinema  webslinky #055science made fun  webslinky #054space  webslinky #053zombies  webslinkyarchive
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