AP National Conference presentation on Point of View
European History Development Committee My teaching philosophy is shaped by the tenets of Pragmatism and Reconstructionism. It was my reading of Cornel West’s and W.E.B. Du Bois’s works as a high school, undergraduate, and graduate student that shaped my sense of intellectual and practical purpose. West’s synthesis of Christianity and pragmatism promulgated my construction of theodicy that finds its premise in the writings and thought processes of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, and John Dewey. My courses look to inculcate the point of view of the oppressed and alienated class, as it is this class that has traditionally been neglected among the privileged and in the literature of study. I find the teachings of Christ and Marx to be synonymous in that both look to eradicate social vice and poverty, racism and hate, as well as greed and materialism.
Through the teaching of history, it is my objective to first deconstruct a false knowledge of history by teaching students to build a new synthesis that challenges their prior knowledge. It is at this point in which a teacher and a student work collectively to reconstruct a new historical synthesis. Reconstructionism contends that society is in need of constant reconstruction and change, and such social change involves both a rebuilding of knowledge and how society uses that knowledge to transform the teaching and learning of materialism. Mortimer Adler, who reflects some of the qualities of the realist school of thought, proposed a Paideia method of instruction, which emphasizes a discussion/seminar style of teaching and learning. As opposed to lecture, I find the discussion/seminar method of instruction to be more liberal, hence invoking greater academic freedom of thought. Furthermore, it is here that students focus more on logic, process, synthesis, and analysis over rote memory and conclusion. As for research, I am currently involved in multiple writing projects. Last year the Western History Association accepted a paper of mine that examines European actors and their shift from the Atlantic market. This work looks at Eastern European states and the North Atlantic market during the period of the 18th and 19th century. This 2008 meeting took place at the WHA’s annual conference in Salt Lake City, Utah. I am also engaged in a long term research and writing project that looks historically at race and independent schools. The United States witnessed one of its greatest historical increases in private day schools between 1950 and 1980. Much of this increase is credited to the rise of Supreme Court rulings on matters such as religion, de jure segregation, and abortion. Unlike other historians who look at political policy and de facto segregation in explaining the rise of religious Christian schools and nonsectarian independent schools, I am reviewing their work to explain demographic developments of schools and communities while my work concentrates more on the historical experience of black students in private schools. I must address this question: How do I narrow the scope and focus of a goal that is not too broad…but one that can be geographically extensive? I will continue to look at three categories of schools: 1.) Christian schools that emerged after 1954. 2.) Nonsectarian independent schools. 3.) Boarding Schools. During the summer of 2008 I presented a week long Advanced Topics European History seminar at Texas Christian University (TCU) in Fort Worth. I also delivered a paper at the National Conference for Social Studies (NCSS) conference in Houston, Texas during the month of November on race, gender, and Atlantic history. In June of 2009 I presented a session at the AP National Conference on "point of view" with a Mrs. Cowart. Our session looked at ways to instruct teachers on the challenges of the DBQ. I have been doing some work towards completing two journal articles this summer; one looks at the historical impact of rap music and the socioeconomic conditions that shaped race relations during the 1980s; much of this piece looks at the pedagogical significance of teaching the 80s via music and pop culture in the U.S. history survey course; the second article is one that I have started but will be co-authored with another colleague; we will examine the teaching of point of view and historiography in the classroom. My other writing project is a book project. Here is what my friend and colleague noted about this project on his webpage: W.E.B. Du Bois and Religion: A Brief History with Documents (Forward by Edward J. Blum). Co-edited with Phillip Luke Sinitiere, this is a collection of primary sources that reflect Du Bois’s thoughts on faith, spirituality, and the political implications of religion. Documents include those that address religion from a sociological perspective, religious artwork, and spiritual fiction, among others. This collection also includes a timeline of Du Bois’s life, bibliography, and study questions. |
