says those efforts always fail in the end. Photo by michellegibson, iStock.
Media Contact: Carmen Ramos Chandler, carmen.chandler@csun.edu, (818) 677-2130
There’s an old axiom that “history is written by the victors.” To that end, there have often been efforts over the years by those in power to re-write historical markers or erase memorials that contradict their versions of history.
California State University, Northridge archivist Keith Rice, a historian with the university’s Tom & Ethel Bradley Center, said those efforts always fail in the end.
“They aren’t the only ones who are preserving history and their versions are not the only versions of history out there,” Rice said. “There’s a saying that if you think that what you are doing is important, then you’ll document it. The dominant society has always documented what they do. Hitler and the Nazis documented their atrocities because they thought it was important. It is for future generations to use this documentation and say, ‘Look what you did.’”
He noted that when one tries to erase history, “it’s like telling your kids not to do something. You’re actually inviting them to do it.”
“You try to erase all of our history,” he said, “people are going to be more aware and more conscious about saving it.”
Everyone has a smart device today and uses it to record every aspect of their lives, he added, making it harder for those who want to make their stamp the only one on what is history to succeed.
He noted that the predominance of smartphones, social media and the internet make it easier for people to “document” history as it happens, making it harder to hide things that those in power may not want people to see.
“By documenting the things they think are important in their lives, people are capturing what is happening at the moment in the lives of everyday people,” Rice said. “The internet, social media and cell phones definitely play a role in chronicling history now and preserving it. The issue is information access and the ability to combat misinformation. There is so much out there that is not true. You have to know how to go to valid sources to check these things.”
That’s where professional historians and archivists come in, he said. Rice pointed to a video of boxing great Mohammad Ali allegedly dancing on the old television show “Soul Train.”
“A lot of people saw it, but it was AI. It never happened,” he said, “To me, AI is a tool. You have to know how to check it.”
If someone wants to confirm that something is real, Rice said, they can reach out to institutions dedicated to preserving history like the Bradley Center.
The Tom & Ethel Bradley Center’s archives, housed in the University Library, contain more than one million images from Los Angeles-based freelance and independent photographers between the 1930s to the present. The core of the center’s archive is a large collection of photographs produced by African American photojournalists. Oral histories, manuscripts and other ephemeral materials support the photographic collection.
The archives contain more than 70 oral histories from African American photographers, civil rights leaders and organizers, individuals involved with the history of Los Angeles, journalism, the group Mexicans in Exile and the United Farm Workers, as well as the personal papers of many individuals and organizations. The center’s Border Studies Collection examines the issues surrounding the border between the United States and Mexico.
“There are archives and museums for everything out there,” Rice said. “You just have to look.”
Rice said people have a misconception that archivists and historians are only interested in “the big things.”
“But the reality is that those pictures you take of your neighborhood parade, wedding announcements and school events give future historians insight into what life was like for everyday people,” he said. “Often, they provide a glimpse into the lives of communities that are often ignored and treated as less than and remind people that we are all actually the same. That American history is all of us. That we all contribute to this country.”
There is a downside to people capturing history with dozens of clicks on their smartphone, Rice said.
“Somewhere on the cloud are all these pictures that tell the story of what community and society was like in June 2026,” Rice said. “It’s thousands upon thousands of images and someone, a historian or archivist, is going to have to sort through them all. Can you imagine what it is going to be like? A mess.”
Rice has a “pet peeve” about how people treat history.
“How can political administrations make the same mistakes that other administrations have made before?” he asked. “I assume they have no historians in their administrations. I mean why would you go start in a war in Afghanistan if you don’t know the history? Russia was there for 10 years, didn’t win and had to leave. A historian could have told you that. Vietnam is another example. The French were there long before the Americans and lost. The old axiom that you can learn from history actually applies.
“There’s a new axiom that I heard a few years ago that also applies, ‘History doesn’t repeat itself, people do,’” he continued. “Some of the answers to a lot of the issues that we find pressing can actually be found in history if we study it. I think we’re of the age where you can say nothing is new.”
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