Public Humanities is about having a responsibility not only to your work but to the public as well. It is about being present in communities outside of the academic round while informing and engaging the public. This could mean changing your writing position to accommodate a wider audience, but it also means staying true to your goals and blog concept.

Scholars have used blogging to engage a wider audience and to find their voice in the academic realm. While blogging is used to, as defined by (Lambert and Yates) “establish one’s presence as an expert, and to provide protection against being plagiarised by others”. The problem is that blogging often fails to achieve this; some are less likely to believe the credibility of a blog and people are less likely to properly cite their use of the source.

An example of the public failing to believe credibility is the push back Sarah Emily Bond faced with her articles about ancient statues haven been finished with a coat of paint and not just white marble we have come to identify with them. The discovery was made by applying ultra violet lights to the status which revealed “polychromy versions of them” (Sarah Emily Bond). In order to make this discovery publically accepted, scholars need to do more than simply blog about it. One thing Bond mentions which will help engage the public is to have museum show both what the original looked like and what the weathered version looks like. Find ways for the public to experience both versions of the marble statues so that they can understand the “contextual frame” (Sarah Emily Bond). Other things that need to be done are to update textbooks and other platforms where these white marble images are available. If more of the public engaged with scholars, not just in terms of museums, but for movies and videogames, there is a chance that it becomes easier to accept.

I would agree with Colleen Flaherty that white washed antiquity has “influence[d] white supremacists ideas”; however, I would also argue that in recent years, especially with the post-colonial movement, more ethnic groups are relying on classical antiquity, especially race in classical antiquity to promote diversity and advance their own agendas. Some interesting, more recent, reads associated with this include: Emily Greenwood’s We Speak Latin in Trinidad: Uses of Classics in Caribbean Literature; Felix Buldemann’s Greek Tragedies in West African Adaptations; and Elke Steinmeyer’s Post-Apartheid Electra: In the City of Paradise. Therefore, we know that the public is being educated about ancient civilization. The problem is, it is not being done widely enough.

The public also has their own role to play in that they need to do research before they start to attack scholars online. For those public figures who are non-experts but do have a voice, they are responsible to make sure that they look into whether or not a statement can be supported instead of shutting out the claims being made. Public humanities is as much about the scholar being responsible for reaching out to the public as the public learning to accept and engage with the work of scholars.