retain and explain

English

Verb

retain and explain (third-person singular simple present retains and explains, present participle retaining and explaining, simple past and past participle retained and explained)

1. (policy) To preserve historical material regarded as problematic (such as statues), with appropriate contextual explanation, rather than destroying it or attempting to erase it from history.
   • 2010, J. I. Packer, Gary A. Parrett, Grounded in the Gospel: Building Believers the Old-Fashioned Way, page 31:

     [W]e have opted in this book to use the word catechesis rather than substitute something in its place. Our strategy is to retain and explain, rather than to reject and replace.

   • 2022, Kevin Coffee, Museums and Social Responsibility:

     The Roosevelt Memorial contest is parallel in time but also distinctly different from the 'retain and explain' position of the Conservative UK government regarding British colonialist monuments.

References

• Press release: New legal protection for England’s heritage