Transcript slides - Justin Reich

Justin Reich
Harvard Graduate School of Education
 How was General History instruction and curriculum
implemented in the century following English High’s
establishment?
 What were the narratives in General History textbooks
used in 19th century Boston, and how did those
narratives articulate America’s place in human history?
 To what extent does historical instruction in 19th
century Boston cohere or conflict with the literature of
19th century social studies in America?
 “The AHA and the Seven effectively gave birth to
modern history education in the United States.”
 Orill and Shaprio (2005), “From Bold Beginnings to an
Uncertain Future: The Discipline of History and History
Education."
 “However, prior to 1861, what would later be called
social studies was in a rather chaotic condition” (p. 5).
 “ The report of the Madison Conference presented the
framework for the modern style history that swept into
the curriculum” (p. 7).
 Evans (2004), The Social Studies Wars
These were the good old days. “Those in charge of these
schools had so much confidence and faith in the
leadership of the American Historical Association,”
recalled Rolla M. Tryon in 1935, “that they almost ceased
merely offering history, but required it instead.” Scholars
have described a period of cooperation between colleges
and schools in curriculum making that began in 1884.
For historians, this defeat of General History was
evidence of their own breakthrough of influence in high
schools. The course, it seemed, was gone with the wind.
“It was eliminated root and branch,” a Midwestern
professor commented in 1919, “and the space which it
once occupied has since been so covered that few, if any,
of the later generation of school pupils know of its
former existence.
- Allardyce (1990), Toward World History: American Historians and the Coming
 And in fact, Boston adopts a block system 20 years
before the Madison Conference
 Early world history instruction was dominated by
textbook recitation
 To abandon the textbook “would be for the mariner on
the boundless ocean to throw overboard his compass
and chart.”
 Textbooks didn’t change; a “millenarian” narrative
structure endured through generations of General
History textbooks
 Millenarian as “universalizing teleology”
 Curriculum and instruction was bound by the
constraints of the textbook narrative structure, and
since textbooks remained constant, curriculum
remained bound by stable constraints
1821-1835: Whelpley’s Compend of History
from Earliest Times (and others)
1835-1877: Worcester’s Elements of History
Ancient and Modern
1877-1890: Swinton’s Outlines of History
Ancient, Medieval and Modern
1890-1923: Sheldon Studies in General History
Myers’ General History
-From George Emerson’s Remembrances of an Old Teacher (p.58)
The quotation is from a description of his teaching at the Boston’s Girl’s
School, but it represents well the instruction of the era.
From Rev. C. Lenny’s Questions for Examination of Tytler’s Elements (p. 1)
From Alexander Fraser Tytler’s Elements of General History (p.18)
 “ Thus did nationalism, millennialism, and
evangelicism converge in an ideology of civic piety and
pious civility.”
-
From Lawrence Cremin’s American Education: The National Experience, 1783-1876 (p. 57)
 “The principles of democracy are identical with the
principles of Christianity.”
-
From Catherine Beecher’s Domestic Economy (p.25)
“All events, past, present and to come, are
employed in directing and completing the
destines of all creatures, in subservience to
that infinitely great and glorious kingdom,
which shall never be removed.”
 Boston School Committee:
 Ancient and Modern History and Chronology
 English High School:
 General History
 3 years
 2 years
“It is a brief barren abstract of events, put
together with no other relation of cause and
effect than that which chronology makes
inevitable; it states facts without the least
regard to their relative importance and gives
the same apace and emphasis of comment to
a Welch foray, whose consequences died
with its slain, as to the act of adding to
Magna Charta the clause requiring the
assent of Parliament to the imposition of
taxation.”
-From the Report of the Annual Examiner,
1845, Boston School Committee
“Can the [Mexican] war be
justified on moral or religious
grounds? But however this
question may be answered, it is
to be hoped that a beneficent
Providence will bring good out of
evil, and cause, in the final result,
an advancement of human
freedom and human happiness,
of good government and of true
religion. “ (pp. 327)
 1860
 1 year
 1870
 3 years (2 hours per week)
 I- Ancient
 II- Medieval
 III- Modern
Worcester’s Chapters
Madison Conference Blocks
Egypt
The Phoencians
Assyria and Babylon
Persia
Greece
Rome
4th Year: Greek and Roman History with
Oriental Connections
The Middle Ages
France
5th Year: French history
England
6th Year: English history
Europe
America
7th Year: American History
Expanding the definition of
Millennialism as a universalizing
tendency
Sheldon’s Studies in General History
Myers’ General History
 Medieval: “There is a destiny that shapes our ends,
rough-hew them as we will.”- Shakespeare
 Modern : “Infinite Providence, thou wilt make the day
dawn.” - Richter
 19th Century: “Ring out a slowly dying cause,/ And
ancient forms of party stryfe;/ Ring in the nobler
modes of life,/ With sweeter manners, purer laws./
Ring out false pride in place and blood,/ The civic
slander and the spite / Ring in the love of truth and
right/ Ring in the common love of good./ Ring in the
valiant man and free,/ The larger heart, the kindlier
hand; / Ring out the darkness of the land,/ Ring in the
Christ that is to be.” - Tennyson
 1906
 Three points (half-credits)
 Ancient
 Medieval
 Modern
 1923
 Myers General History removed from approved book list
 Myers Ancient and Myers Modern remain on the list
Years
Textbook
Course Structure
Impending Millennia
18211824
Whelpley, Compend
and Tytler, Elements
of History
3 years of General
Universal Salvation
Universal Democracy
18241835
unclear
2 years of General
18351860
Worcester, General
History
2 years of General
Universal Salvation
Universal Democracy
18601870
Worcester, General
History
1 year of General
Universal Salvation
Universal Democracy
18701877
Worcester, General
History
3 years (2 hours/week) of
Ancient/Med/Modern
Universal Salvation
Universal Democracy
18771890
Swinton, Outlines of
History
3 years (2 hours/week) of
Ancient/Med/Modern
Universal Aryan Unification
18901906
Sheldon, General
History and Myers,
General History
3 years (2 hours/week) of
Ancient/Med/Modern
Universal World Order
19061923
Myers, General
History
3 half-credits of
Ancient/Med/Modern
Universal World
Government
1923-
Myers, Ancient and
Myers, Modern
3 half-credits of
Ancient/Med/Modern
Universal World
Government
 For Historians and Historiography
 History instruction in the 19th century is not chaotic; it’s
organized by textbooks
 The Committees of N are not a watershed; they
recommend a course of study already supported by
textbooks
 The history of world history instruction and social
studies in America go back to the early Republic, and the
stamp of Millenarianism remains a key organizational
principle in the century that follows, and perhaps into
our own time.
 For Policy-makers
 Textbooks in the 19th century exerted powerful
constraints on instruction and curriculum and perhaps
continue to do so. Reforming curriculum without
reforming textbooks may be folly.
 For Educators and Teacher-Educators
 Textbooks, which remain remarkably consistent since
the 1820’s, retain the cultural legacy of civic piety and
millenarianism. These ancient biases continue to shape
our current instruction, often in ways we don’t
recognize.
 Identifying these ancient biases in contemporary texts,
can be quite fun, and quite enlightening
 Many thanks to those who read earlier versions of this
presentation:
 Jill Lepore
 Julie Reuben
 Meira Levinson
 Becca Miller
 Aradhana Mudumbi
 Anna Saavedra
Volume I: Ancient
Volume II: Modern
 Mesopotamia
 Europe
 Assyria
 Crusades
 Persia
 Turks
 Greece
 Macedon
 Rome
 Germany
 France
 Britain
 Present Day
 Europe
 Asia
 Africa
 America
 Egypt
 The Phoenicians
 The Middle Ages
 France
 Assyria and Babylon
 Persia
 England
 Europe
 Greece
 Rome
 America
 Ancient
 Medieval History
 Modern History
 Egypt
 Byzantium
 16th Century
 Assyria and
 Charlemagne
 17th Century
 Crusades
 18th Century
 Chivalry
 19th Century






Babylon
Hebrews
Phoenicians
Hindoos
Persia
Greece
Rome
 Age of Revival
Ancient History
Medieval and Modern
History
 Eastern Nations
 Middle Ages
 Egypt
 Dark Ages
 Babylon
 Age of revival
 Assyria
 Modern
 Hebrews
 Reformation
 Phoenicians
 Revolution
 Perisa
 Democratic Reaction
 India and China
 Greece
 Rome