Categories
Early TV History Historiography

Traces of the Past

In the last paragraph of Lynn Spigel’s “Installing the Television Set,” Spigel quotes historian Carlo Ginzburg, who writes: “Reality is opaque; but there are certain points—clues, signs—which allow us to decipher it.”  Why do you think Spigel closes her analysis of post-war television’s role in American domestic spaces with this quote?  How does she describe her historical approach or methodology? What types of “traces” of the past does she examine in this essay and how does she use them?  Do you agree with her approach to history?