Due to its direct approach and its detailed analysis of race, the "A More Perfect Union" (AMPU) speech makes for a likely primary source to be included in a lesson addressing Obama's racial significance. As social studies teacher-educators who draw from critical perspectives on race and racism, the authors hope to see Obama's speech used…

Disciplinary literacy encompasses not only the ability to read the texts of a discipline, but also to engage in the practices and discourse of that discipline. At the center of the discipline of history is inquiry. For these students to move from their ninth grade expectations about history toward the authentic discipline of history, they would…

Although geographically rooted in the Southern United States, the U.S. poultry industry is best understood in a transnational, or even global, perspective that can be difficult to address in regionally bounded courses. In intellectual terms, the topic straddles a number of historiographic subfields that have steadily grown in recent decades. These…

Most people are familiar with television quiz shows that use such technologies as Audience Response Systems (ARS) and keypads known as "clickers." A similar technology has been available for teachers. Inserting questions into a PowerPoint presentation or running free-standing software, the class is asked to consider a question and select…

As in any historical endeavor, periodization is an attempt to manage change, and present it coherently, by noting points where key breaks in framework occur. In world history, periodization has come to convey, particularly, shifts in the pattern of interactions and contacts among many, though not always all, major societies. In this article, the…

Historiography is often overlooked as a fascinating subject by most contemporary students, whether in the secondary history classroom or undergraduate course. Some sense of the changing historical interpretation of a topic such as Reconstruction may be provided through contrasting passages from a modern history text with earlier editions of books…

Many students assume that history has nothing to do with them and therefore is a waste of their time, so finding a way to get involuntary history students truly involved in a topic is always the most challenging aspect of teaching it. As passive listeners they will remember little; as active participants they will remember more and--in at least a…

Comparing the biographies of individuals is a technique that can be used to illuminate the larger history of a society. As an illustration, comparative biographies of two dissident leaders, Huey Long and Father Charles Coughlin, are discussed to show how they reflect the social and political history of the 1930s. (RM)

Considers Arendt's argument that Eichmann was an example of how Nazi totalitarianism changed modern concepts of evil. Concludes that an amoral bureaucracy, whose goals transcended personal judgment, involvement, or responsibility, is part of the social environment which still constitutes a threat today. (AM)

Specific teaching strategies are provided which employ the use of popular music to reveal issues of social change. (SM)

One aspect of human activity that seems to recur is warfare. The author draws lessons from the military history of Sparta and Athens that are relevant to nations today. (SM)

The question, "What were the causes of World War I?," has become one of the classic historical debates of which there seem to be endless permutations. In the past 90 years historians, journalists, and politicians have offered many more or less rational explanations for the war. Although at least some of the usual "causes"…

Describes an undergraduate history course based on two themes: sport as a reflection of society and sport as a socializing agent affecting society. The course focuses on sports and industrialization, traditional and modern sports, political and economic aspects of sport, and inequality and discrimination in sports. (Author/JK)

Discusses the use of novels in studying social history. Proposes that the contents of novels be accepted not as a set of answers about a society, but as a set of questions, plausible hypotheses as to how the historian might organize his evidence. (Author/JK)

Describes a successful approach to college-level modern history teaching using three case studies to examine the technical, social, and political conditions shaping government policy. A discussion of problems inherent in this teaching method is included. (AM)