Roots controversy is part of a larger cultural conflict | Opinion

• A recent debate over banning the novel “Roots” in Knox County schools highlights a larger cultural conflict over how history is interpreted.
• Historically, societies have often preferred uplifting, simplified narratives of the past over fact-based, critical accounts.
• The modern, professional study of history gained prominence in the 20th century, leading to new interpretations that challenged traditional views.
• This “new history” has faced a backlash, exemplified by recent Tennessee legislation banning “divisive concepts” in schools.

The recent local showdown over banning the novel “Roots†in Knox County public school libraries is a mere skirmish in a much grander cultural war.

From ancient times to the present, religious and political leaders and much of the public have preferred uplifting views from a static past that convey selectively positive, unchanging messages. Consider regular retelling of George Washington's cherry tree tale or accounts of a more physically robust Washington throwing a silver dollar across the Delaware. The persistence of those tales suggests that honesty and physical strength have been more valued over the years than historical accuracy.

Practitioners of a competing take on history challenge this approach. They question if the cherry tree tale ever occurred and remind us that there were no silver dollars at the time of Washington's presumably prodigious feat.

The one view of the past finds credence in faith, the latter in facts.

The modern discipline of history was a relatively late arrival among “scientific†pursuits stirred by the 16^th century Renaissance. It gained wider audiences with the Enlightenment and trickled down in diluted form to the masses as the twin forces of industrialization and modernization challenged every facet of modern life.

Ironically if predictably, traumas associated with modernization lead many today to prefer the old history and question its irreverent foes. Although 19^th century pioneer historians confidently assumed fact would lead to Truth, their more astute heirs begrudgingly realized that most facts require interpretation. And that interpretations change from one historian and one era to the next.

New interpretations of history emerge

Nonetheless, as the 20th century dawned, professionally trained historians gained prominent roles in emerging universities. By the aftermath of World War II, a generation of increasingly specialized scholars engaged in seemingly endless rounds of ever more specialized, often narrow revisionist histories. A few ridiculed “myths†like the George Washington tales. But few beyond academic circles paid attention.

Then came “the sixties†‒ or more precisely the turbulent years c. 1965-1980s, when we baby boomers came of age. As unexpected setbacks collided with inherited, lofty (unrealistic?) expectations, disillusionment set in. Meanwhile undergraduate enrollment skyrocketed, and graduate schools churned out ever more, irreverent PhDs.

The Civil Rights Movement ignited this change as revisionists challenged notions about slavery, race, segregation, gender, identity, and related matters. These new historical insights trickled down to inform the far more accessible prose of journalist Alex Haley's semi-autobiographical “Roots.â€

Simultaneously, as our Vietnam adventure became a quagmire, scholars discovered other marginalized groups. More broadly, they attacked previously sacred American events. Under unprecedented scrutiny, tragic human and environmental consequences were attributed to our much celebrated “conquest of the West.†And unbridled capitalism fueled widening income disparities. These irreverent insights trickled down in movies like “Little Big Man,†“Dances with Wolves,†“Glory†and “12 Years a Slave†and eventually new interpretations at museums and historic sites.

Tennessee lawmakers try to ban ‘divisive concepts’

As the 20th century wound down, some who preferred more conventional, uplifting versions of our past questioned the “new†history and initiated a new, inevitable wave of counter revisionism. But only the puzzling, polarized paralysis and cynical opportunism that accompany today's interconnected economic, technological, and cultural traumas explain the backlash that led our Tennessee General Assembly to ban the teaching of “divisive concepts†and subsequent proscriptive legislation that justified banning “Roots.â€

As COVID taught us, history is hardly alone among questioned “scientific†pursuits. Oddly we practitioners of the “new “history should be least surprised with this backlash.

Locally calmer minds and popular memories of the beloved Haley, who befriended many East Tennesseans when he late in his career made East Tennessee his home, contributed to a ceasefire in Knoxville's recent skirmish.

Perhaps awareness of the battling versions of history conveyed here will further contribute to this uncommon common sense.

Teacher-historian Mark Banker shared insights over 40+ years into the American and human experiences in five books, numerous essays and presentations. His book “Appalachians All: East Tennesseans & the Elusive History of an American Region” (University of Tennessee Press, 2010) challenges popular understanding of Knoxville's and East Tennessee's history. He teaches fellow retirees at ORICL (Oak Ridge Institute for Continued Learning) and composes a weekly column for his hometown Roane County News. He can be reached at mtbanker1951@gmail.com.