World History
Academic Exchange Quarterly has an interesting article titled The Mirror Crack?d-History Reflected by Hollywood. It is by Paul D?Amboise and Avery Plaw. This article examines how mainstream (Hollywood) history films can be productively incorporated into high school and university history classrooms. It presents the findings of an experimental case study of the use of mainstream film in an Advanced Placement high school history course, and based on those findings suggests a sample module for a twentieth century history course combining film and text-based approaches to history.
Movies used included:
A Man for All Seasons (1966)
Elizabeth (1998)
1492: The Conquest of Paradise (1992)
The Quiet American (2002)
The Path to War (2003)
Thirteen Days (2000)
We Were Soldiers (2002)
From the site:
As the habit of reading continues to decline, especially among the young, history teachers are increasingly confronted by students whose impressions of the past are shaped by the mainstream historical films that Tony Barta has called ?the most powerful engine of popular history in our culture.? (Barta, 1998, 2) The most prominent of these films are popular, Hollywood-style releases that characteristically sacrifice historical accuracy to the imperatives of emotionally-satisfying narrative resolution and commercial success. As a result, many students arrive in class with a deep background of historical misperception.
Faced with engrained historical misrepresentation, history teachers can respond with two basic strategies. Firstly, they can swim against the tide of increasingly cinematic history and continue to insist on the traditional text-focused curriculum, dismissing more popularized depictions of their course material. Secondly, they can attempt to adapt to the changing times by beginning to strategically incorporate popular historical films into the classroom despite their frequently dubious accuracy.
While recognizing that the first pedagogical strategy is not without merit, it is the second strategy whose potential we wish to explore here. We suggest the following merits of the second strategy warrant a closer examination of how it could best be accomplished: (i.) historical films provide a richer visual depiction of events than equivalent texts, are (ii.) an experience the class can more easily share, and therefore (iii.) are simply more inclined to instigate wide-ranging discussion than equivalent texts. Furthermore, (iv.) historical films will continue to exercise an enormous influence over most students; thus it only make sense to equip students with critical viewing capabilities. In addition, (v.) students have an enduring affection for unmasking manipulation, and the honing of this skill is likely to enhance the interest of history as a subject. Finally, (vi.) incorporating film into the core curriculum in no way necessitates the exclusion of relevant texts. On the contrary, historical films will generally give a visual immediacy to the events described in history texts, and thereby enhance their interest. Moreover, the employment of relevant texts in debunking the inaccuracies and manipulations of mainstream films will tend to enhance rather than diminish their importance. Indeed, it is the critical symbiosis produced by integrating dramatic visual narrative within a rigorous text-based curriculum that holds the greatest promise for enhancing historical understanding in the long term.
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World History
The Mirror Crack’d-History Reflected by Hollywood
Academic Exchange Quarterly has an interesting article titled The Mirror Crack?d-History Reflected by Hollywood. It is by Paul D?Amboise and Avery Plaw. This article examines how mainstream (Hollywood) history films can be productively incorporated into high school and university history classrooms. It presents the findings of an experimental case study of the use of mainstream film in an Advanced Placement high school history course, and based on those findings suggests a sample module for a twentieth century history course combining film and text-based approaches to history.
Movies used included:
A Man for All Seasons (1966)
Elizabeth (1998)
1492: The Conquest of Paradise (1992)
The Quiet American (2002)
The Path to War (2003)
Thirteen Days (2000)
We Were Soldiers (2002)
From the site:
As the habit of reading continues to decline, especially among the young, history teachers are increasingly confronted by students whose impressions of the past are shaped by the mainstream historical films that Tony Barta has called ?the most powerful engine of popular history in our culture.? (Barta, 1998, 2) The most prominent of these films are popular, Hollywood-style releases that characteristically sacrifice historical accuracy to the imperatives of emotionally-satisfying narrative resolution and commercial success. As a result, many students arrive in class with a deep background of historical misperception.
Faced with engrained historical misrepresentation, history teachers can respond with two basic strategies. Firstly, they can swim against the tide of increasingly cinematic history and continue to insist on the traditional text-focused curriculum, dismissing more popularized depictions of their course material. Secondly, they can attempt to adapt to the changing times by beginning to strategically incorporate popular historical films into the classroom despite their frequently dubious accuracy.
While recognizing that the first pedagogical strategy is not without merit, it is the second strategy whose potential we wish to explore here. We suggest the following merits of the second strategy warrant a closer examination of how it could best be accomplished: (i.) historical films provide a richer visual depiction of events than equivalent texts, are (ii.) an experience the class can more easily share, and therefore (iii.) are simply more inclined to instigate wide-ranging discussion than equivalent texts. Furthermore, (iv.) historical films will continue to exercise an enormous influence over most students; thus it only make sense to equip students with critical viewing capabilities. In addition, (v.) students have an enduring affection for unmasking manipulation, and the honing of this skill is likely to enhance the interest of history as a subject. Finally, (vi.) incorporating film into the core curriculum in no way necessitates the exclusion of relevant texts. On the contrary, historical films will generally give a visual immediacy to the events described in history texts, and thereby enhance their interest. Moreover, the employment of relevant texts in debunking the inaccuracies and manipulations of mainstream films will tend to enhance rather than diminish their importance. Indeed, it is the critical symbiosis produced by integrating dramatic visual narrative within a rigorous text-based curriculum that holds the greatest promise for enhancing historical understanding in the long term.
- 10 Most Historically Inaccurate Movies?
Yahoo! has an article up titled 10 Most Historically Inaccurate Movies. The subtitle notes, "Films that make your high school history teacher cry." Here are the ten that made the list: 1. 10,000 B.C. 2. Gladiator 3. 300 4. The Last Samurai 5. Apocalypto...
- Top 3 Worst War Films
Back in September, The Osprey Publishing Blog had a post on the Top 3 Worst War Films. I discovered this post via the 7th Military History Carnival. The carnival author noted, "I asked what the Top Three Worst War films were and what war films our readers...
- Bureaucrats And Barbarians
Bureaucrats and Barbarians. Richard Hooker summarizes the civilization of Crete and southern Greece up until the time of Homer and provides an atlas and a gallery as well. The site covers the period of the Greek Dark Ages. I had not heard this time referred...
- Cfp: Teaching History
CFP: Teaching History. This is a call for papers that relate to the teaching history from Academic Exchange Quarterly. From the site: Focus: We welcome manuscripts on teaching any historical subject, time period, or region. Here are some questions...
- History Film Reviews Galore!
The American Historical Association has recently put together a really wonderful list of historical films and their associated reviews. The list also includes relevant articles related to the films and/or subject matter. While I've certainly had...