History, like current events, tends to be complex. And when we write or speak about historical happenings, obviously, what gets discussed or reported is not necessarily what happened. Everyone knows that.
But what's more important, is the way in which different aspects of history get looked at, emphasized, or de-emphasized. And different things become exposed or become clearer because they are looked at from different angles or perspectives.
People tend to choose what they wish to remember, what they try to forget, and what the presumed lessons might be from real events that occurred in the past. And this changes over time.
When I was in graduate school studying Chinese history, my adviser, Sherman Cochran, simply loved a book called " Discovering History in China: American Historical Writing on the Recent Chinese Past," by Paul A. Cohen. Every time he spoke of it, his eyes lit up. Basically it's a history of how Americans have approached the study of Chinese history and how that has changed over the decades. Very interesting. Well worth reading for the serious historian.
(You can learn more about the book here: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1952590.Discovering_History_in_China )
And nowhere at the moment, is this perhaps more true than with Columbus. He's shifted from hero to villain, when the truth was, obviously, much more complex. Of course, most people know that Columbus "discovered" America by accident while engaged on a ground-breaking, high-risk attempt to open a new trade route to India. Most of us also know that he never realized that he had found a pair of new continents and that when he did land, he not only treated the indigenous inhabitants very badly, he paved the way for years of exploitation and colonialism. Yet for decades he was and to many still is, remembered as a heroic figure. This needs to be put in context and not just swept aside as uninteresting and wrong headed. If I can cite Sherman Cochran, my above mentioned thesis advisor, an important part of studying and learning history is what motivated the people of a certain time and place to do and believe the things they did? And again, with Columbus, what not only motivates the people who are quick to cast him as a villain and destroy his statues, but what also motivated the people who worked hard to put those Columbus statues there in the first place?
The answer, interestingly, is that both groups of people, the Columbus-statue-builders, and the Columbus-statue-destroyers, were motivated by anti-racism and the desire to make the United States a more equal and culturally embracing place to live. Yes, both sides.
Here are a couple essays that I found on the subject that I think are well worth reading. They both discuss Columbus and his fame and role as a hero in the context of Roman Catholic Italian-Americans seeking Italian-American heroes and symbols at a time when Protestant White Supremacist Nativist sentiment was an important part of the American societal landscape. In other words, they speak of the use of Columbus as a symbol and force against American racism.
The first one is by Heather Cox Richardson, a historian and history professor at Boston College. She is responding to a recent 2020 White House Proclamation celebrating Columbus day. ( https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/proclamation-columbus-day-2020/?utm_source=facebook&fbclid=IwAR0konL1VlriDq137qBSx70ko0JVWbTZev-2Gl50b1W9AicHtgpNjf06FZk ) Personally, I find her essay much more interesting and thoughtful than the White House Proclamation.
Heather Cox's essay on Columbus from October 2020.
Jason Colavito is an author and popular historian who specializes in analyzing and explain the actual facts behind sensationalized claims of ancient and early history, particuarly those involving claims of "ancient aliens." Here he writes of Columbus, again, as a symbol for countering discrimiation against Itlaian Americans.
(As another aside, again when in graduate school studying Chinese history, my thesis advisor, Magnus Fiskesjo, recommended that I read a book called "Terra Cognita -The Mental Discovery of America," by Eviatar Zerubavel. If you have any interest in Columbus and the "discovery" of the New World by Europeans, I highly recommend this book. The author is an Israeli cartographer and his focusing is to find an answer to the question of "If Columbus did not know he had found new continents, when and how did Europeans realize they had found completely new continents? A so-called "New World"? In this book Zerubavel approaches the important question, seeking answers in maps by early explorers and others to see what they were representing of their discoveries and when and how they came to realize they had "discovered" something completely new. The answer, of course, is complex, and depicts an evolution of thought as more and more evidence is collected. Again, well worth reading.
You can learn more about the book here: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/379776.Terra_Cognita
