1 Monument Controversy Solutions Name Course Date 2 Monument Controversy Solutions Cities all around the United States are having heated debates about the appropriate placement of public memorials and monuments. The most prominent of the discussions have centered on Civil War monuments, most of which are located in the southern states of the United States. This makes perfect sense when considering that most public memorials honoring the Confederacy may be found in this area. Nevertheless, the movement for reevaluating monuments and memorials is in no way restricted to a particular geographic location. In September of 2017, Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York City nominated a Municipal Consulting Committee on City Craftsmanship, Monuments and Identifiers to evaluate the city's public monuments to J. Marion Sims who did experiments on enslaved women that got him the nickname "The Father of Modern Gynecology", Christopher Columbus, and Theodore Roosevelt, as well as the Canyon of Heroes in Lower Manhattan. This review is intended to determine whether or not the monuments should be (Buhler 2019). This panel was assigned with the responsibility of reviewing the public monuments located across the city. The ultimate proposal made by the commission was to move the statue of Sims while retaining the other things in the same location as they were before. In contrast, as a result of the demonstrations that followed the shooting of George Floyd in May of 2020, several monuments were either taken down, or plans for their demolition were announced. Monuments honoring the leaders and military of the Confederate States of America, an unrecognized country that was created by the secession of seven slave-holding states and existed from 1861 to 1865, were the primary targets of removal during this period (Cooper et al. 2021). In other instances, monuments were taken down in an official capacity by the local government, such as the removal of the Confederate War Memorial in Dallas, Texas. 3 In some of these other instances, protesters were responsible for the destruction of monuments, such as the Statue of Albert Pike in Washington, District of Columbia. During the George Floyd protests, the attention widened to include additional statues seen to celebrate slavery and prejudice (Eisikovits 2020). For instance, several sculptures of Christopher Columbus were taken down in the United States since his presence on the continent of America represented the beginning of colonization and the extermination of people who were indigenous to the area. The book “Controversial Monuments and Memorial: A Guide for Community” offers the deepest understanding of these controversies and stakeholders' viewpoints. As racial supremacy, political quagmires, and aspirations of reconciliation with the past intersect, the book addresses the complex issues faced by people across the United States and similar areas abroad (Allison 2018). The events in the summer of 2017 that culminated in Charlottesville are an offshoot of ongoing discussions and debates over contentious history that involve a wide range of historical contexts and every aspect of U.S. history. This book explores ways to communicate effectively with people and examines how other nations have attempted to overcome their unpleasant pasts. In addition, this book features articles and case studies from various museum professionals, academics, and civic leaders who interpret the past for their guests. The source that left the greatest impression on me was "Monument Wars: Washington, D.C., the National Mall, and the Transformation of the Memorial Landscape" by Kirk Savage. The dramatic transition from the 19th vision of a decentralized landscape to the 20th ideal of "space," in which power is concentrated in an increased center and the monument is converted from an object of veneration to an experience space, is essential to this tale (Savage 2011). Savage's entertaining and astute study tracks the shift from monuments that glorify triumph and 4 valor to memorials that memorialize victims. Monument Wars is an indispensable guide to the National Mall that offers a fresh and intriguing perspective on more than two centuries of American history. 5 Bibliography Allison, David B. 2018. Controversial Monuments and Memorials: A Guide for Community Leaders. Google Books. Rowman & Littlefield. https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=JAFeDwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PR7&d q=controversial+monuments&ots=VzVWC7JEB&sig=QAEPcKxuZUBQO1MrA1ekK4X5zLs. Buhler, Clinton Jacob. 2019. “Confederate Statuary: The Difficulty of Preserving Contested Historical Monuments.” IL CAPITALE CULTURALE. Studies on the Value of Cultural Heritage 0 (19): 557–71. https://doi.org/10.13138/2039-2362/1989. Cooper, Christopher A., Scott H. Huffmon, H. Gibbs Knotts, and Seth C. McKee. 2021. “Heritage versus Hate: Assessing Opinions in the Debate over Confederate Monuments and Memorials.” Social Science Quarterly, April. https://doi.org/10.1111/ssqu.12969. Eisikovits, Nir. 2020. “Not Set in Stone: Five Bad Arguments for Letting Monuments Stand.” Journal of Global Ethics 16 (3): 404–13. https://doi.org/10.1080/17449626.2021.1873164. Keefer, Natalie, and Tori K. Flint. 2022. Mindful Social Studies: Frameworks for Social Emotional Learning and Critically Engaged Citizens. Google Books. Rowman & Littlefield. https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=7tCAEAAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PA87& dq=controversial+monuments+in+america&ots=NM2FywO6s&sig=iFzazW4sUoCIsjd5FSRIZi5rf4E. Savage, Kirk. 2011. Monument Wars: Washington, D.C., the National Mall, and the Transformation of the Memorial Landscape. Google Books. Univ of California Press. 6 https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=MbswDwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PP9& dq=Monument+Wars:+Washington.