Tanya Evans has a very clear and consistent goal for this book: to persuade academic historians, especially, that family historians should be taken much more seriously, not dismissed as dilettantish hobbyists. As the director of the Centre for Applied History at Macquarie University in Australia and the leader of many workshops on how to do family history, Evans is well positioned and qualified to advocate on behalf of these industrious and enthusiastic researchers. Unfortunately, this book seems unlikely to make many converts.
Evans too often belabors the obvious or writes opaquely. Take this key sentence, for example: “My continued research with family historians is committed to the belief that the historiographical projects of social and cultural history, with the history of emotions, are mutually constitutive; that learning and teaching should be collaborative; and that history researchers should aim for pedagogical and political impact” (p. 26). The book is also weakened...