Good post by Kevin Levin on the remoteness of historians from the public. Won't be able to change it.

Kevin Levin has the following post.

http://cwmemory.com/2016/03/20/more-talk-about-confederate-monuments/

Essentially Levin explains that historians often exist in their hermetically sealed world and are irrelevant.

He doesn't ask though why the things are the way they are. It is limited to a conception that there is a wrong headedness in engaging the public.

But it is a good start, but if it is an end in Levin's thinking it will be for naught.

One reason is that academics don't want to be the targets of neo-Confederate groups. The history is that universities don't defend their academics and often harass academics who are the targets of neo-Confederate groups. I am not going to list all the examples here.

But since Levin can't bring himself to say the word neo-Confederate he won't be able to address one of the reasons that academics avoid engaging the public on these issues.

Also, there is the issue of what advances a career in history. It usually is citations in journals and the number of articles in journals.

It is good that Levin has raised the issue, but he is bound in the same system that produces the behavior that he decries and so he won't be able to change it. He will be unable to look at the root cause and only see a wrong headedness on this specific issue.