History 398: Workshop in
Historical Thought and Methodology
Spring Quarter 2005 Professor J. Wu
Mondays and Wednesdays
Hagerty 186 Phone: 292-9331
Office Hours: Monday
Description and Objective
What is history and how do historians study the past? This course is designed to introduce history majors to the field of history. Through readings, films, and discussions, we will explore various purposes for studying history, the types of sources available to reconstruct the past, and different methods or approaches to examining history.
To help us understand how historians know what they know, we will focus the readings, discussions, and films on the issue of identity and specifically the genres of biographies and autobiographies. How have historians studied and interpreted identity? How do they learn about people’s sense of their own selves? How can the study of individuals reveal broader historical changes?
This course will provide an opportunity to develop analytical reading skills as well as logic and clarity in your written work and oral presentations. Designed as a workshop, the success of this course depends upon your active participation. You will be expected to come to class prepared to discuss your ideas about the readings and to listen to your colleagues.
The course syllabus and reading questions are available at the following website: http://www.history.ohio-state.edu/people/wu.287/courses.html. Be sure to look for the Spring 2005 version of History 398.
The following books will be available for purchase at SBX. The books and additional readings will be on reserve at the Main Library.
James West Davidson and Mark
Hamilton Lytle, After the Fact: The Art of Historical Detection
Conal Furay and Michael J.
Salevouris, The Methods and Skills of
History
Josephine Tey, The Daughter of Time
Natalie Zemon Davis, The Return of Martin Guerre
John G. Neihardt, ed., Black Elk Speaks
Kevin Boyle The Arc of Justice: A Saga of
Race, Civil Rights, and Murder in the Jazz Age
Judy Tzu-Chun Wu, Mom Chung of the Fair-Haired Bastards: The Life of a Wartime Celebrity
Assignments
All assignments must be turned in at the beginning of the class that they are due. No late papers will be accepted. All work presented in class or turned in must be a student’s own. Plagiarism or any other form of academic misconduct will be dealt with in accordance with the guidelines laid down by the University’s Committee on Academic Misconduct and will seriously affect a student’s grade.
If you have a learning disability requiring special arrangements for completing assignments, please let me know as soon as possible.
1. Class attendance and participation are mandatory (20% of your grade). Complete the assignments before class and be prepared to engage in discussion. If you are unable to attend a class, you must inform me beforehand. You may not pass this course if you miss too many classes.
2. An analysis of Tey’s The Daughter of Time (15%). Write a 2-3 page paper describing the different kinds of evidence that Inspector Grant uses to build his case. How does he treat these various types of evidence and what conclusions does he draw from them? What rules of historical inquiry can we learn from this mystery?
3. A precis (15%). The precis is a summary of the author’s main points and arguments in your own words. Begin by identifying the work that you are summarizing; be sure to use the correct citation format. Quotations of more than a word or two or a very short phrase are not acceptable. It is essential that your precis show the logical connection between the authors’ ideas. It should not simply string together a series of descriptive sentences. You must write an organized essay that follows and explains the authors’ arguments and the reasoning behind them. Writing a good precis is very difficult; sloppy and careless work will not be accepted. The precis should be approximately two-three double-spaced typed pages. You should consider writing one paragraph for each chapter of the work that you are summarizing.
4. A critical book review of Black Elks Speaks. (15%) Write a 2-3 page review of the book, focusing on how a historian might use it as a source. Remember to include information about how and in context the book was created. A review must be critical; that is, it must discuss both the positive and negative aspects of the book. Under no circumstances may it merely summarize the contents. Reviews should contain an introduction and a conclusion, and quotations must be noted with accurate page references in the footnotes.
5. A biography of an individual of your choice. (35%) Write a paper (7-9 pages in length) and construct a website or design a visual display about the person that you decide to study. In your biographical project, consider the various approaches to analyzing identity and the significance of individual lives for illuminating broader trends in history. For your paper, make sure to organize your study around a thesis that makes an argument about the person that you are studying.
28 March: Introduction – Lecture
30 March: What is History?
Davidson and Lytle, After the Fact, Prologue and chapters 1 and 2
4 April: The Historian as Detective
Tey, The Daughter of Time
6 April: Assignment due: Analysis of Evidence
Read Methods and Skills of History, pp. 207-216 for guidelines about how to write a history paper
View: Memento
11 April: Social History and the Problem of Identity
Natalie Zemon Davis, The Return of Martin Guerre
13 April: Assignment due: Precis
Read Methods and Skills, ch. 7, pp. 105-110,
and Set A, exercise 3 (pp. 116-117) for guidelines about how to write a precis.
History panel: Q & A with historians
18 April: The History Major and Career Options
Maria Mazon, Introduction to the History Major
Earnest Perry, History and Education
20 April: The American Frontier and Grand Theory
After the Fact, ch. 4 and 5
25 April: Oral History and Autobiography
Black Elk Speaks
27 April: Contextualization
After the Fact, ch. 7
William K. Powers, "When
Black Elk Speaks, Everybody Listens," in Religion in Native
2 May: Assignment: Book Review of Black Elk Speaks.
Read Methods and Skills, pp. 111-112, for guidelines about how to write book reviews.
David Staley, History and the Internet
4 May: History and Photographic Evidence
After the Fact, ch. 8, 11
Assignment: Photographic Analysis
Guest Speaker: Denise Mangen
9 May: New Biography
Wu, Mom Chung of the Fair-Haired Bastards, up to p. 115
11 May: Popular Culture and Identity
Finish Mom Chung
View:
16 May: Library Orientation with David Lincove
Meet
in Main Library, Rm. 122
18 May: Preserving and Displaying History
Tentatively scheduled: Meet at the
Special
Time:
23 May: Popularizing History
Boyle, The Arc of Justice, up to p. 170
25 May: Finish The Arc of Justice
Q & A with the author
30 May: Memorial Day
1 June: Visual Presentations and Turn in Papers
Assignment: Biography and History