Making history

The Memory of the Civil War in American Culture is a collection of essays that all revolve the central theme of the “geography of Civil War memory.” As editors Alice Fahs and Joan Waugh explain in their introduction, that geography incorporated both “physical and symbolic spaces” (2). The memory of the Civil War has been contested in numerous arenas and over the course of time; the strengths of this volume are the wide array of subjects it covers and how it shows change over time. In broad terms, the ten essays (and epilogue) reveal how generations since the Civil War have debated and constructed memories of the war in three areas: in Civil War memorializations and monuments, through history books and literature, and through political campaigns. Four of the essays deal with the construction of Civil War memory through memorial rituals and celebrations and the construction of monuments. An essay by David Blight on the evolution of Memorial Day celebrations traces how “the reconciliationist legacies of the war eventually overtook the emancipationist ones” (95). This is a thesis that persists throughout the volume. Blight explains that, in the immediate aftermath of the war, the vast numbers of war dead required some sort of explanation and meaning. Reconciliation proved to be the most common form of healing on a national level. Whites successfully relegated to the background the role of slavery in the war and the achievement of emancipation during the war, thus helping perpetuate the South’s Lost Cause interpretation of the war. Lost Cause mythology endured for a century before it was seriously challenged by the civil rights movement, the subject of an essay by Jon Weiner. Weiner explains how the celebration of the war’s centennial in the context of the burgeoning movement helped to challenge conventional memory of the war but also bolstered neo-Confederate attitudes and symbolism (most notably the use of the Confederate flag as a symbol of