Comments on: An Expert? Ummm…No.

By: Harry Smeltzer

Harry Smeltzer — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 20:55:25 +0000

Arrogance – yeah, that sounds like the right word. Thanks Dave!

By: Dave Powell

Dave Powell — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 12:11:19 +0000

Harry,

You’ve cleaned up some of those definitions, haven’t you? I always heard that the “expert” was the A*****e from out of town.”:)

I will endorse the idea that there’s alaways more to know. I started studying Chickamauga years ago because I found Gettysburg constantly thronged with “experts,” real and imagined, and got tired of hearing/reading the latest goofy theory on why Lee lost.

But I didn’t expect to spend the next dozen years researching and collecting material on the fighting around Chattanooga, either. Still am, though. Why this coming weekend I will be taking a trip to the Wisconsin Historical Society to track down some potentially fascinating articles on a couple of aspects of the campaign. And I am always on the lookout for a new primary source.

Expert is a double-edged sword. It’s a word that connotes not just knowledge, but also perhaps a degree of…arrogance? Self-importance? I don’t know, but I can see why folks shy away from using it.

And it can act like a red flag to some…more intense (shall we say)… hobbyists.:)

By: Harry Smeltzer

Harry Smeltzer — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 02:42:47 +0000

Thanks Mike – it’s good to know you’re out there keeping guys like me in line!

By: Harry Smeltzer

Harry Smeltzer — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 02:42:17 +0000

Thanks Terry. I don’t know all – or maybe even most – of the answers, but I have good ideas about how to find them!

By: Mike Musick

Mike Musick — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 01:21:44 +0000

Harry: Your post really resonates with me. I worked for years in a job with the federal government where I was officially a “Subject Matter Expert” on the U.S. Civil War. I hated the word “expert,” but it evidently had some special meaning in the civil service scheme of things, and was a promotion. The title is supposed to come in handy in courts of law, though I’ve read that it alienates some jurors. Obviously, there were and are a great many things I don’t know about the subject (one imagines “OK, Mr. Expert, what was the color of the facings on the uniforms of the pre-war Regiment of Mounted Rifles?” – or some such scenario). Eventually, I learned to live with it, but the word still bugs me.

By: Terry Johnston

Terry Johnston — Thu, 06 Jan 2011 23:02:51 +0000

A comment, of course, in response to the thrust of your post–not on your own qualifications, for lack of a better word, as an expert on anything. Though I’m not sure there are many folks, other than yourself, I’d go to with a question on Bull Run.

By: Terry Johnston

Terry Johnston — Thu, 06 Jan 2011 22:59:24 +0000

Amen, sir.