This is a
history course, but it won’t merely provide you with an
historical perspective and factual data to absorb for later
regurgitation on a final exam. Instead, you will explore the
notion of
“history” itself, what it is, how it represents things, how it should
be read, why we must stay engaged with it, and how understanding it is,
as Orwell suggests, as much about the present and the future as it is
about the past.
We will
explore diverse representations—photographs, essays,
a film, a
graphic novel, a memoir, and a novel--of two historic events called "holocaust": the extermination of Jews by the Nazis and the dropping of nuclear bombs on Japan by the United States.
What do these horrific events mean? In what ways are we still, after more than half a century still swimming in the waves these human actions caused? What makes these events iconic?
We will explore the necessity of remembering the
past and the issues involved in doing so by considering
questions of historical guilt and responsibility, sorting out fact,
opinion, and fiction, learning about primary and secondary sources, and
exploring what evils we humans are capable of and also what we are
capable of preventing.
In this
class, you can become a more ethical, self-confident, and
self-aware “maker of history.” By learning how to read historical
discourse more critically, you’ll develop your ability to make the
right choices, as a citizen in a democracy and as a human being. And,
by learning how to write (or make) a history (which you will do in an
in-depth research project), you will begin to shape the on-going,
always changing, and terribly important conversation about what matters
in the human story and why.
