Introduction
Several years ago when I was a much younger teacher, but not any less handsome, during the course of a totally normal class period something interesting happened that I will never forget. A student raised a point of opinion during our discussion of Richard Nixon and referenced the textbook in relation to her comments. The comment itself I cannot remember, though I think it had something to do with him being a crook. My response was unsettling to her. I disagreed with the book. "How can you say that the book is wrong Mr. Joyce?" she asked. "It's not that the book is wrong," I said, "but rather that, it is not fully telling of the entire set of circumstances and I have a different point of view." She was amazed and after pausing for just a moment said, "so how are we supposed to know the truth, read lots of books on the subject and make up our own minds?" as if this were unthinkable. And of course I affirmed that this was in fact the tragic path she would have to follow if she wanted to be comfortable with her knowledge!
I relay this story not to denigrate this student nor even to point out the naiveté of my students in general but to indicate particular points of interest implicit to the formulation of this unit. First, the "truth" is very difficult to ascertain. There are lots of biographies of Abraham Lincoln, for instance, and though I have not read them all, I am sure they have some clear differences as to the "truth" of his life and service. So I guess I'm claiming that one might endeavor to do all the reading of all the biographies of Lincoln and still not have anything like a consensus on the truth of his life. We have lots of perspective and opinion to mull over but in the end those can be terribly confusing to our students who are looking for answers. Most are so programmed to think there is one factual version of history and they can easily end up in the situation like my student was with the textbook version of the Presidency of Richard Nixon; moreover, all students can begin to think that there are always, without much dispute, tangible facts even when reason can point in lots of other directions. Certainly there are things we can all agree upon, but there are also many areas for dispute. And I think this can be a severe detriment to student interest. Added to this is the enormous problem of scale. The amount of reading it might take to develop a scholarly opinion or perspective in history is probably incalculable. The mass of history might be broken down into smaller histories or even biographies but these are often massive undertakings. And it is unrealistic to think that there are many students of high school age ready to take on this challenge.
Given this dilemma how are we to lure students into being interested in history when it can be so perplexing and intimidating? I think we can pare down the debate, and the infinite number of questions, agendas, and priorities in biographical and historical works and create some kind of entryway for new scholars, or at the very least, make history a more approachable subject. It is part of the aim of this unit to do so.
And I think biography offers us an opportunity to attack this problem head on. Biographies are essentially like micro-histories. They focus on singular lives (sometimes the connection of several lives) and by function allow readers to peer into history through a life or set of lives. I want to take this one step further. I would like my students to look at American history by using the biographer's craft on a more micro level. Students will write micro-biographical essays on subjects of their choosing. These will be written on a scale more suitable to the research abilities of young people who are for the first time attempting serious scholarship. In doing this, students will scale down the mass of history into more consumable parts and see for themselves that the study of history is well within their grasp.
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