Reenactment Culture in Virginia: Visions of a White Republic |

Each summer Sunday in Richmond, Virginia, St. John’s church holds a historical reenactment of an event almost 250 years old. The reenactment of Patrick Henry’s “Give me Liberty of Give me Death” speech at the Second Virginia Convention on March 23, 1775, features an all-white male cast who play George Washington and Thomas Jefferson and other “founding fathers” in attendance that day. The St. John’s Church website refers to Henry’s speech as “immortal,” and bills that reenactment as a “must see landmark for anyone interested in the universal struggle for human rights.” The Patrick Henry reenactment allows the audience to participate in voting “yes” to taking action against tyranny and repression. This event, which holds a special significance to Virginias, as the proclamation for war and independence occurred in their state, is attended by thousands of people a year. Nationalism and pride in one’s country are two qualities taken seriously in our country, as many believe they hold us together and encourage work towards common goals. This is especially true in the commonwealth of Virginia, as state with over 400 years of history and was a critical place in not only the founding of the United States, but in the preservation of the nation and the ideals it represents.

While this speech is iconic in U.S. history as one of the first rallying calls for independence and revolution, the reenactment itself is an indicator of something else entirely than the concept of freedom. Done in the nostalgia of a time in U.S. history in which the themes of self-determination and protest were a crucial part of being an American, the Patrick Henry reenactment allows the audience to participate in voting “yes” to taking action against tyranny and repression. However, centuries later this exact moment in time, a time where blacks, women, indigenous people, and all other minorities were not only not included in the convention, but excluded from society, continues

to be reenacted and celebrated speaks to the moments in history Americans still identify as the most important.

Reenactment has taken many forms in Virginia, whether as hired actors in Jamestown and Williamsburg to the Civil War enthusiasts who reenact the clash of Union and Confederate soldiers on the weekends. These reenactments span centuries, from the English encounter with the Powahatan nation in 1607 to the reenactment of the Battle of Appomattox in 1864. It is an interesting concept to think that each day thousands of paid actors dress up in costumes and play the part of our historical countrymen and women. These reenactments are done in the effort to preserve history and promote memory and comradery among its U.S. visitors.

Yet the ritual reenactments act as an indicator of something more than a simple celebration of liberty. The reenactment of “Give me Liberty of Give me Death” is, like the wider historical reenactment culture to which it is a part, fueled by a nostalgia for an earlier age where white men ruled America politically, culturally, and socially. Both the convention of 1775 and its twenty-first century recreation write out the American indigenous people and women of all races.

The act of attempting to relive the past, whether for personal pleasure or monetary compensation has become a rather controversial topic in modern discussion. Although according to cultural studies scholar, Vanessa Agnew, some see reenactment as a result of Americans turning towards an interest in history, especially when the subject was well neglected by the public for generations, others believe that in recreating events or actions from the past, we are not able to truly move forward from the thought processes and social constructs from the periods in which are being reenacted. In an effort to make the past “come alive” reenactments obscure as much as they reveal, rending invisible non-elite and non-white peoples from the narrative of American history.

Reenactments are also a source of big revenue for the foundations and organizations that employ the reenactors, with the Foundation of Colonial Williamsburg totaling its assets at $18.5 million in 2014. Visitors come looking for and authentic experience, one they can see in both their heritage as Americans but also as a piece of themselves and how far we have progressed. Richard Handler writes in The New History in an Old Museum: Creating the Past at Colonial Williamsburg, “Ultimately these visitors come…to learn about ‘the past’, ‘their past’-the collective truth about the way life ‘really was’ back at the founding of the great American nation.”This search for a connection with the past was not embedded in the desire to learn exclusively about great men in history, but rather to find the truths in the historical stories themselves and find their relationship relative to the cultural context they were made, which gives each person in attendance to these reenactments the opportunity to identify with one part of the historical story that was and continues to be made up of multiple voices. Although done under the pretense of historical accuracy, reenactments in Virginia lack vital components of the rich and deeply complicated periods of time in which they attempt to tell the story, particularly in terms of race and gender. The men being celebrated for their words at St. John’s church in 1775 were slave owners, men who believed liberty was only applicable to them and no one else in the wider mosaic that was the 13 colonies. However, through this act, the audience is reminded of this time in which freedom only applied to white, cis men and the all-white cast at this reenactment only reinforces the fact that nothing has truly changed in the last two and half centuries for the minorities not present at the convention. Through these reenactment foundation’s exclusion of non-white people, they continue to control the history and its consequences as a learning tool in the present, causing others to ask whose history is truly being presented at reenactments and forces observers to recognize the multitude of people left out of the story.

The very setting and pageantry surrounding the reenactment reinforce the message that this is official American history. The honoring of army, navy, air force and national guard veterans at the beginning of the reenactment indicate this is an official event, one sanctioned not only by those who perform, but also by the traditions of the state. This gives the reenactment itself authority in its political correctness and a sense of authenticity through state approval. Through this connection to the government, the reenactment has a sense of power over those present as the actions and words observed are in a sense indorsed by the government, making them untouchable to the public.

Although reenactments continue to draw numbers of tourists each year in the commonwealth of Virginia, social changes have resulted in increasingly declining numbers of people willing to attend and pay for this type of historical preservation. Seeing drastically lower numbers than in years past, “seismic shifts in America’s cultural and economic landscapes over the years had done serious harm to Colonial Williamsburg’s bottom line.”Whether this decrease in attendance is due primarily to Millennials’ fiscal decisions or a different cause, it is evident in the numbers that as the years go on, the number of people who visit Williamsburg and other historical reenactments is projected to continue to drop. “For Colonial Williamsburg to succeed-ironically, to remain the same in the most critical ways-it would have to change in others,” one of these ways should include incorporating more narratives into the story it tells of U.S. history as well as a more diverse group of actors.

The reenactments that bring so much tourism and interest to the commonwealth of Virginia also exacerbate historical patterns of segregation and racial exclusion. By omitting African Americans, along with other minorities, from the reenactment culture, their voices and perspectives are not represented not only in the present for their audiences, but in the future. A new way of thinking about reenactment is possible. Indeed, in the years following the example set by the producers and cast of Hamilton, the face of scripted U.S. historical moments is changing. Society expects a wider variety of America’s people to be represented in these moments that are generated for amusement and pride. Going forward, it will become increasingly crucial for reenactment culture to include the perspective and faces of people of color. It is time reenactment culture catch up to the present day in terms of inclusion of all people and tell the real story of America’s history.