Monthly Archives: February 2016

Woodrow Wilson at Princeton

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wilson

UPDATE: Read the recently released report explaining Princeton’s decision to keep Wilson’s name on University buildings.

Woodrow Wilson, one of the figures you have been reading about this week, made the news last semester when students at Princeton staged a protest demanding that his name be removed from the campus’s buildings and schools.

Their protest won the approval of the New York Times editorial board, and for some writers the event (coming in the wake of larger discussions about Confederate memorials in the South) raised larger questions about which figures should be honored in the public square and on college campuses.

Others, including a historian at Princeton, argued that the focus on Wilson’s racist policies at home was obscuring his problematic foreign policy. To put it in terms that Crisp and Trouillot might use, he suggested that in correcting one “silence,” the conversation about Wilson at Princeton raised the danger of creating another, different “silence.”

Writing Assignment for Feb. 25

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Before writing in your Google Doc this week, be sure to complete the reading assignments. Then you’ll be ready to write this week’s writing assignment.

For that writing assignment, I want you to develop a position of your own on some question that has arisen so far in this course. I’m giving you greater latitude in terms of topic than I’ve given you before, but you should not forget to keep the learning rubric in mind as you write.

After you’ve developed a position that you’d like to take, you can craft an essay for ONE of the following scenarios:

  • Imagine you are submitting a 700-word op-ed reader essay to the Houston Chronicle.
  • Imagine you are writing an email home to one of your high school American history teachers.
  • Imagine you are addressing a letter to your elected representative on the Texas State Board of Education.

Put your assignment in your Google Doc as usual.

Also, here are some reading questions that I’d like you to consider. You are not required to use them to frame your writing assignment, but they and the other reading questions we have discussed this semester may help you form your position.

  1. Do you agree with James Loewen that “heroification” in American history textbooks is a problem? If not, be sure to respond directly to his arguments and show why you think they are faulty. If you do agree with Loewen’s analysis of “heroification,” what are some possible solutions? Be sure to use examples and evidence from Loewen’s article when answering this prompt to demonstrate that you understand his argument, whether you agree with it or not.
  2. Based on evidence presented in this week’s readings, how much of a role do you think textbooks, schools, and educators play in Americans’ sense of history and the past? If Americans have a distorted or selective view of the past, are teachers and schools the primary culprits? Or are there other causes that you can point to?
  3. Both Sam Wineburg and Michael Frisch report on experiments they have done that are very similar to the exercise we conducted on our first day of class this semester. What do you think their findings tell us about the way American students view America and its history? Be specific in your discussion of their findings, and notice that the articles are separated by about twenty years.
  4. Do you think there are hidden costs to society or national unity if “heroes” are “debunked”? Based on your evaluation of the costs and benefits of dispelling legends about the past, do you think the goal of teachers of history be to represent the past as faithfully as possible, warts and all, or do you agree with social conservatives on the Texas Board of Education that history teachers should represent America as positively as possible?

Happy Presidents Day

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I hope you are all enjoying Presidents Day. I’ve spent a part of it thinking about how presidents often become “legendary Americans” of the sort we have been studying. As we saw when we discussed Francois Furstenberg’s book, Americans often turned to George Washington, above all, as a symbol of the nation’s highest ideals. And I think we’ve seen that this continues even today, especially at moments of high partisan conflict of the sort that Parson Weems and Federalists like Washington himself often deplored.

Consider, for example, the recent cover of the New Yorker magazine, which depicted a number of presidents (Washington most prominently) expressing chagrin about Donald Trump:

ny-presidents-cover

That cover reminded me of a discovery I made a few years ago, which is that searches for Washington’s Farewell Address on Google still peak in October and November: in other words, around elections. You can see the trend for yourself. The popularity of that search seems to have been highest in October and November of 2004, a moment of extreme political division.

Perhaps, then, the patterns that Furstenberg noticed in the ways that Washington and presidents were used in the early republic to address fears of political division have not gone away. Indeed, there may be a whole host of ways in which Weems’s work in deifying Washington continue to influence us, as historian Joseph Adelman argues in an article for The Atlantic today.

What about you? Have you noticed past Presidents or Washington being cited today to speak to the concerns of this election cycle?

Writing Assignment for Feb. 18

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Next week’s reading and writing assignment will depart slightly from our usual practice.

Before beginning the assignment, you should still complete the assigned reading, which is Camilla Townsend’s Pocahontas and the Powhatan Dilemma. But I won’t be giving you specific reading questions this time, so to prepare for our discussion, you’ll have to use the reading skills you’ve gained this semester, as well as your understanding of the Three Big Questions and related issues we’ve raised, to think about what we will likely discuss.

Your writing assignment will also be different. Instead of giving you specific questions to respond to, I’m going to give you some “real world” writing scenarios (listed below). Though the assignment is different, my expectations about it are not: you should still use the rubrics on position-taking and effective communication when writing.

Choose TWO of the following scenarios and complete the task associated with each. Put your work in your Google Doc as usual.

Scenario 1: Recently the Treasury Department has announced its intention to put a woman on $10 bill. Imagine that the Department were to announce that it has selected a representation of Pocahontas for the bill, sparking a controversy pitting supporters of the bill against opponents. Your task is to develop your own position, and then imagine that you have decided to create a petition to the White House using its online portal. You should write the text of the headline and description that you will use for your petition on that site, as well as the text of an email you plan to send to your friends and family explaining why you want their support for the petition. Both must draw on the available evidence from this course and the understandings and expertise you’ve gained so far in “Legendary Americans.”

Scenario 2: Imagine that students at one of the colleges on campus have announced plans to host a new themed public party called “Colors of the Wind.” From the marketing for the party, you have learned that the organizers planned to encourage attendees to costume themselves as Native Americans; the poster features an image of Pocahontas. Controversy has ensued over the college’s plans, especially after the University has announced that it will not allow the party to take place because of the theme. Your task is to write a letter to the Rice Thresher staking out your own position on the controversy. The letter must draw on the available evidence from this course and the understandings and expertise you’ve gained so far in “Legendary Americans.”

Scenario 3: Imagine that the HISD School Board is reevaluating the movies that it keeps stocked in its elementary schools. One of the movies up for discussion at the Board’s next meeting is Disney’s Pocahontas. Your task is to write a statement that you will read to the School Board, following its guidelines for addressing Board meetings. The statement must draw on the available evidence from this course and the understandings and expertise you’ve gained so far in “Legendary Americans.”

Important Notes: Regardless of the scenarios you choose, you will need to practice Audience Awareness, the fourth of our Four Capabilities in this class. That may mean you need to do some research about the real-world expectations and requirements for each of these writing scenarios. Whichever you choose, you should also keep in mind that you have a broad base of evidence, readings, and insights to draw on from this course, and so you should use those available materials as fully as possible. Don’t hesitate to use applicable points or evidence from earlier weeks’ readings and discussions if it will help you defend your position. While you may use the same points or evidence in your responses to both scenarios, that may not always be advisable; keep in mind that some evidence that may be especially powerful for one audience may not be as powerful for the other.