Author Bio.:
William H. McNeill was born Oct. 31 1917 and is a Canadian-American Historian that is most known for the publication of "The Rise of the West"(Chicago, 1963). He attended University of Chicago and received his PhD from Cornell University and eventually became a chairman at University of Chicago.
Date/Context:
(1985) This work was to help explain to the normal person why history is so important to everyone and why it should be continued to be taught and learned eagerly to further the minds of every individual. The author was worried that the children of the United States were so far behind the rest of the world so he wanted to change the perspective of history and how important it is to the betterment of the children.
Summary:
The idea of studying history along with the study of the world today is a very important idea and American Historical Association hopes to convince this across everyone. History is like a memory of what you did in the past, suppose you forgot who your friends are or what you said yesterday. It would make it very difficult the next day to continue to move forward in life and to avoid future mistakes. These memories are just like the past history. Furthermore, a great deal of our everyday behavior was formed in the past, or essentially, the past history. Even the cave paintings and such artifacts from the past are still able to be understood because of the use of writing and language that we continue to use today. Historians use the past just as memories are used to everyone, they further delve into the past to find the hidden blessings of the disguised failures to better understand what the future holds.
History is often looked at as a waste of space in the students schedule from skeptics of the importance of history. But without the knowledge of history, how would students be able to express their extreme intelligence in the manner of combining and placing different ideas into one big overview? Patterns and other important turning points in history must be known by everyone to help conduct a careful reflection of these events. History helps one to understand that there will be differences among ideas but there will also be similarities and both of these ideas can bring two ideas closer or farther from one another. In addition, learning of others religions and beliefs expand the knowledge of oneself, therefore making that one person more understanding of the people around them. There is not a certain truth to everything, history can change constantly, that is why it is important for everyone to learn and understand all aspects of history.
Key Quotation:
"Historical knowledge is no more and no less than carefully and critically constructed collective memory." "Without individual memory, a person literally loses his or her identity, and would not know how to act in encounters with others."
I found the comparison between seeing friends and historical facts to be quite interesting, along with the exaggeration of the importance of history, and the putting of history into perspective. I wonder though, what were some of the events in this time period that might have inspired this writing? Also, why exactly is the United States so far behind in the teaching of history and how can it be fixed in a country-wide manner?
ReplyDeleteYour summary and analysis were accurate and thorough, although you may want to consider using fewer examples. In addition, you should have included the reasons the skeptics gave for not wanting to teach history. I believe that these were some of the important concepts from the document. Finally, your key quotation was an excellent choice, since it captures the main ideas from the document into a concise statement.
ReplyDeleteThis document was written in the 1980s after the publication of "A Nation at Risk," a document that "showed" American schools and students were lagging behind the rest of the world in math, science, and literacy. Some felt that there needed to be a greater emphasis on these subjects and less focus on history. In this speech, McNeill argues that history is essential for understanding one's place in the world and for developing critical thinking skills.
ReplyDeleteThe summary was a bit vague in areas. Use specific details from the document to support your position. McNeill criticizes both the "scientific" approach to history (advocated by J. Diamond in GGS 20 years later) and the trend of focusing on current events. He argues that schools need to identify overarching themes ("the whole" of history) while using new forms of history (qualitative history and social history) to better understand local, national, and global history.