Four Things We Ought to be Doing to Teach History Better

Four Things We Ought to be Doing to Teach History Better

1) Quit sanitizing it!
History is not always pretty. In fact, it's often fairly horrific. One thing it is not, however, is boring. Students complain about how dull and monotonous history is, but that's only because it's being "taught" as a dry recitation of dates and treaties rather than a human story of blood, perversion, lust, and betrayal. Let's not fool ourselves; kids are already exposed to plenty of porn and gore. So why not tell them the truth? History is a grand pageant of sex, violence, greed, bitter personal feuds, petty jealous rivalries, vanity, pride, pathological cruelty, and some of the strangest carnal exploits imaginable. History is also an extraordinary collection of tales of exploration, discovery, adventure, faith, hope, redemption, the triumph of persistence, the occasional defeat of evil and ignorance by the forces of reason and kindness, and some really cool clothes.

2) Quit simplifying it!
History is complicated and frequently uncomfortable. History is a complex and ambiguous tangle of contradictory facts. History is a mysterious paradox. A deep and nuanced understanding of any aspect of history depends upon the assimilation and appreciation of thousands of closely intertwined factors.

Imagine, for instance, a group of 100 people. What is their story? Obviously there is no one story — there are at least 100 stories, each of which is interlocked with many others.

Yet we love a compelling narrative, and we love to prove points, so it's easy for the historian with an agenda to conveniently ignore what doesn't fit and generate a neat, tidy object lesson. A led to B, which caused C. Therefore, D. End of lecture.

This need to keep things simple and easy leads to widely repeated "facts" that are preposterously inaccurate. My favorite example of this is the dumb old elementary school concept that "Christopher Columbus discovered America while trying to prove that the world is round." No one who reads this blog believes that, but a shocking number of children are being told this and an even more shocking number of teachers seem to think it's true. Can we just take a moment to enumerate a few of the ways this 13-word sentence is wrong?

* In the 15th century, no one thought the world was flat, certainly not kings and navigators.

* Columbus did not "discover" the "New World." There were already millions of people living here, and there had been for centuries.

* Columbus was not even the first European to reach the North American continent. (Norse explorer Leif Ericson established a settlement on the northern tip of what we now call Newfoundland in Canada nearly 500 years before Christopher Columbus sailed.)

* Columbus never reached the North American mainland. He only reached the Bahamas. (And other Caribbean islands on later voyages.) When a teacher says Columbus "discovered America," the word "America" is implied to mean "the United States." This is disingenuous; The Commonwealth of the Bahamas is not part of the United States.

What's even worse, this simplified narrative makes Columbus sound like a noble hero. If you read contemporary accounts of his conduct (and even, in some cases, his own journal), you find that he and his brothers and the men of his crew mercilessly terrorized, stole from, tortured, kidnapped, and enslaved the natives he encountered, sometimes parading their dismembered bodies through the streets as a grim warning to others. His reign of tyranny and genocide puts Columbus on an equal footing with many of the worst monsters of history. (See the report of Governor Francisco de Bobadilla, who was appointed by Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand to investigate the atrocities after they removed Columbus from power.)

A better way to teach is by looking at the primary source material and doing a guided discussion. To continue with the Columbus example, let's read the story in his own words, and the words of those who were there. The expeditions of Columbus certainly did mark the beginning of the well-funded and systematic colonization of North, Central, and South America by European empires. What were his goals? (Money.) What were his methods? What was his plan? What were his main accomplishments? What was interesting and impressive about these accomplishments? What were some negative consequences? Who benefited? Who lost? What was the impact on the future of North, Central, and South America? How might today's world be different if Columbus had landed elsewhere? How much did it matter that it was Columbus, and not someone else, who arrived in these waters when and where he did? Was the colonization of the region inevitable? Given his connections and sponsorship, what were the implications on European politics? These are worthwhile questions with a multitude of possible answers.

Let's give kids some credit; they can handle the truth. They don't need to be spoon-fed sugary propaganda.

3) Quit making movies that are supposedly about history so ridiculously inaccurate!
Let's just go ahead and face that fact that the typical American gets most of his or her sense of history from movies. I'm not saying it's a good thing. I'm just saying it's an inescapable fact of modern life. So what a missed opportunity it is when those movies depict events in ways that are grossly misleading or wildly wrong. I categorically reject the idea that it is always necessary to alter history to make it entertaining. History is already entertaining! The truth is usually just as good.

I am not insisting that every single tiny detail has to be 100% accurate. Nor am I demanding that the subject of every movie be real-world history. (Science fiction and fantasy movies may be quasi-historical, but there is no expectation that they are anything other than make-believe.) And yes, we go to the movies to be entertained, not educated.

But I am suggesting that IF you DO make a movie about A REAL TIME AND PLACE IN HISTORY you should try to get the most important major events right.

Movies like Pearl Harbor, The Patriot, The Far Horizons, They Died with Their Boots On and Pocahontas implant false beliefs that would have to be un-taught in American History class, and probably never will be.

4) Deliberately make conflicting historiography part of the curriculum.
There are few learning experiences more valuable than reading what appears to be a solid, lucid, well documented academic treatment of a topic with clear and appealing conclusions . . . only to read a second piece of equally robust scholarly research that essentially says, "no, what that other guy said was total bullshit." When I was learning about Victoria Woodhull, I read six books about her life. It was remarkable how differently each of the six authors approached and portrayed her. It was like reading about six different historical figures, not the same woman. This realization encourages students of history to go back to the original primary source material . . . and where there is none, to be very skeptical about what is being "taught."