How to Do It?

Framing US events, people, ideas etc. in relation to a non-US equivalent.  By doing this, students are provided a context and relational view.

-Example:   Everything is relative, but conclusions can be made/argued in context.  Comparison informs our claims about “how revolutionary the American Revolution was” or “how powerful is the US economy.”

The nation-state is not the focus of historical engagement.  Rather ideas, groups, systems,  events, etc. are recognized as phenomenon that cross borders. In addition, historical actors in this approach are not the common textbook actors.  In turn, terms like hybridity, interaction, fusion, synthesis etc. are used in opposition to claims of self-contained, static, packaged national/cultural units.

-Example: Looking at emancipation from a transnational perspective. This recognizes that ideas travel and are guided by people and groups and not necessarily by nations or governments.

US events are situated as an example of larger themes in world history.  It is important to note that global events retain local/national variations and are not seen as simply repeated events.  In this approach US is part of world history, not an exceptional other. 

-Example: The American Civil War had a global impact.  Framing the war as part of a trend in world history that centralized political power and secured national boundaries places our historical view at 80,000 feet.

 At the heart of this approach is the question, “Can we learn about ourselves from the way others see us?” Teachers use non-US perspectives to question national claims, beliefs, and preconceived notions  about US history.

-Example:  The sky is the limit.  The book History Lessons  provides an interesting start by looking at how textbooks around the world introduce US history.  In my experience, the Civil War and Civil Rights era are commonly explored from a non-US perspective.

Situating an "American" figure in a non-US context can be unsettling and enlightening. It also raises questions about America(n)s connectivity to the world.  Recognizing the cosmopolitan elements of Americans, as opposed to limiting their context to national borders, expands their agency and our understanding of a topic's breadth, depth, and connective tissue. Agency, systems, and impact move from simple to complex, impossible to plausible, and the obscured becomes luminous.

-Example: Primary sources are especially powerful for this approach. Seeing Dr. King or reading his interviews in Germany, Canada, and Ghana shatter the limits of our historical imaginations and sparks new areas of inquiry. Ultimately we empower students to imagine historical and contemporary spheres of interaction beyond the local and connected to the global.