We sometimes take it for granted that history is a social construct. Out of the wide river of human experience, we dip out a cupful onto the ground and try to read the waters before the earth drinks it up.
History is a story we tell ourselves rather than a photograph of the past. What we include and leave out in the telling reflects who we are. Tell me your history and I will know you.
A while back, I photoshopped this image of The Smiths and included myself standing next to Morrissey. In searching through my server logs for 404 errors, I noticed that several people are embedding this image in their blogs or Myspace pages presumably without realizing that it is not really The Smiths. It’s some bizarro Smiths where I am a member, and yet across these different sites they are inserting me into history. Everyone is familiar with Morrissey, but I can safely replace one of his lesser known band-mates. It’s enough to fool several people even with a half-assed photoshop job.