"While I take inspiration from the past, like most Americans, I live for the future." -Ronald Reagan

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Friday, June 6, 2014

An American Studies Review


Written by: Madeleine Tucker and Reilly Tangen

Have you ever done something that you are embarrassed about, or that you regret?
Alright, now imagine if an entire year was spent discussing your transgression, completely ignoring the multitude of good things you have done in your lifetime.
Would this constitute an accurate picture of your character?
Well, in essence, this is what our American Studies class has accomplished this year. We have spent an entire year focusing on all of the terrible things that our country has done over its 238 year existence. But never once can we recall hearing a praise about our country, or a good consequence of an action or decision. In American Studies we did not learn about American history; we learned about an entirely pessimistic and unbalanced agenda. Not a day went by in which we did not talk about socioeconomic class inequalities, gender inequalities, and/or race inequalities. While these topics may be interesting and warrant some class discussion, an entire year was excessive.

We have learned little, historically, this year in American Studies that would produce an educated generation, which is such a shame. We were looking forward to learning about the full story of our country, chronologically, and seeing how we play a part in world history. We feel as if we have been indoctrinated rather than educated. Contrary to our instructors, we believe in the story of America, a land of freedom. A land that people from all countries have fled to, to escape the troubles of their own homeland. A country that is so confident, that citizens have the right to criticize.

Some things to note from our experience:
  • ●  If you are a Christian, you will likely feel uncomfortable in this class. Actually, It is okay to be any religion but Christian. Christian doctrine is often criticized and portrayed in the most negative light. How could you ever believe such nonsense?
  • ●  If you are white, be prepared to feel guilty about your race, something that no one can control. But other races have no faults, remember.
  • ●  If you are male, you will feel guilty about your gender. C’mon even though we all have the same rights, women­­ still not equal enough. (P.S. go to somewhere where women don't have rights ­i.e. Yemen, and then you are likely to realize the fortune that we have in the U.S.)
  • ●  If you are on the conservative side, good luck. You will always be wrong, and you will be shut down ASAP.
  • ●  If you are upper class, you should feel guilty about how much money your family has. Even if both your mom and dad work really hard and can barely afford to live in the area, you are still obligated to feel as though you are a snob. 

DISCLAIMER:

We would be perfectly okay with the way that this class is being taught if BOTH SIDES and ALTERNATIVE VIEWPOINTS were presented or at least respected. Of course, it is completely natural for people (teachers included) to have their own opinions, but while playing the teacher role, it is necessary to provide both sides of the argument and allow the student to make their own decisions. There, of course, were instances in which we felt we definitely learned something in this class. Analytic skills are extremely important and this class provided its students with a very beneficial amount of those. It is because of this, that we felt prompted and obliged to write this blog. Every moment is an opportunity for growth and learning, and we hope that this entry provided the class with an alternative viewpoint that you may critically analyze on your own. 

24 comments:

Unknown said...

Madeleine and Reilly, I do agree that our American Studies class has spent a lot of time critiquing the flaws of our Nation; however, I believe that being able to critically examine the past is an essential skill all citizens must possess in order for a democratic society to function. We are taught that the purpose of learning history is to ensure that past mistakes are not repeated. Yet we know that history is written by the winners, or at least by humans who- to a certain extent- are all biased. Therefore, how are we to understand past triumphs and tragedies, and succeed where others have failed if history itself is biasedly constructed? I believe that being able to recognize this fact is one of the most important lessons one can draw from our course. I understand that on the surface it may seem like we are being "indoctrinated rather than educated" to believe that America is utterly flawed or built upon lies, but I believe what our teachers are doing is offering us a perspective on our nation we have never seen before. Perhaps I'm speaking on too personal of a behalf, but throughout my 11 years of schooling I have never learned that America has less economic mobility than almost every other industrialized nation. That there is such thing such as the prison-industrial complex, or that Afghanistan has more women in national parliament seats than the US. I have previously learned that America is the land of the American Dream, where anybody of any race, religion, or gender is supposed to be able to climb the socio-economic ladder with hard work, perseverance, and a little bit of luck. The class has personally offered me a perspective which I had never considered before, and given me the skills to analyze, with a critical eye, the world around me. Lastly I would like to say that "socioeconomic class inequalities, gender inequalities, and race inequalities" are the structures that create history. Without inequality- without conflict- how can there be history? I personally believe that history cannot exist without these societal constructions, and therefore believe that spending the whole year studying them was appropriate.

Just thought I would offer my perspective. Intellectual stimulation is fun.

Unknown said...

While as Callie mentioned, your statements about the themes of this year's American studies course being gender, race, and economic inequalities are true, I disagree as well. We started off right away in the beginning of this year by looking critically at each text book and the different historical events that the authors chose to include and the length that they deserved. I believe that the course did something similar to this. We were taught about America and its history as Callie mentioned, from a "different perspective".

To bring it back to the very basics and the what we have most recently been learning about are the Indians and how the british really went about creating this country. When we were children, we always learned of Columbus because the one who came over to this land. We were shown illustrations of the indians and the intruders getting along extremely well and were hardly exposed to the true brutality of it all. Just like this, I believe it is crucial to understand multiple sides of history.

This year, I feel like I have changed an incredible amount in the way that I think. The course has made me think much more critically of this country and the neighborhood I live in. While no one should feel guilty about their living conditions, it is important to learn about the bigger than ever economic gap. Limiting our minds to the idea that America is a country of equality would be naive.

In efforts to make this class different than all the standard scantron based factual class, controversial view points were exposed (as you mentioned). I absolutely see where you are coming from but like Callie, I believe that the topics we focused on this year were beneficial to our critical thinking and a reality check.

Unknown said...

Callie, We appreciate you taking the time to comment! We would just like to note that we are not saying anything along the lines of inequalities in the various themes we have gone over in class are non-existent. We are aware of both sides of our country’s history. We were simply stating that we believe it is very unfair to spend the entire year on it, and which may or may not be the opposite of your opinion. And that’s fine, of course! You are correct in that this class has taught you to “analyze” but that is about where the agreement ends. It has been beneficial in that it has taught us to take everything people say under hard consideration rather than simply absorbing it without putting in your own thinking. The problem is, we cannot simply absorb the biased information from this class, because that would be against what we were taught, right? We must learn by absorbing information which cannot be denied (facts) and then form our own thoughts and opinions on it.

To Isabel (We appreciate you too!) : This is certainly a reality check for all of us. That is agreed on. Simply, for some of us, it is of a completely different kind. For us, anyway, we have been aware once again of what has occurred in this country. It has also been a “reality check” in that we have now been exposed to a style of teaching that we find unacceptable.
- Also, tell me when we were required to look something up in a textbook. We checked to see if events were there, but I cannot recall ever reading about an event from a source like a textbook, which in our opinion is much more unbiased than a powerpoint with no data made by our teachers.
-That “different” perspective that you mentioned, we hope that you realize that is the perspective of our teachers. We are perfectly okay with people having opinions that parallel those of our teachers, but there are other perspectives too! This is the problem with American Studies, the perspective of our teachers is considered doctrine, and we feel as if some are being fooled into thinking that it is fact.
- We already knew the real story of America’s founding. We cannot speak for the rest of the class, but you must understand that the lack of fact in this class was...just incredible. We’ve looked at sources, yes, an abundance of them. And that is great, but, really, the sources were also mostly opinion based. It’s simply, that personally, we did not like that.

In general:

- No one has commented on or denied the most important part of this entry yet, being the one-sided teaching which made us personally angry and uncomfortable all year long. We would not have posted this without sound reason, so I would ask that you please understand the actual meaning of this blog.
- I remind you all to remember this quote from very early in the class: “There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says, 'Morning, boys. How's the water?' And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes 'What the hell is water?'"
It is about being stuck in your own little bubble, no? And unaware of the bigger picture? This class has embodied that quite clearly.

Unknown said...

Madeline and Reilly, I don't want to waste your guys' time because it seems as if your thoughts are already set in stone, but I thought I might as well offer my two cents on the topic. While I understand that, at times, this class can be a bit frustrating, it seems as if you two are under the impression that every class has to be taught from a textbook strictly based on facts. I thought it was clearly established at the beginning of the year that this class was not a normal "read the textbook and do a worksheet" type of class.

I also strongly disagree with you and firmly believe this class forced each and every student out of their own bubble, through crazy projects like the Frederick Douglass project, or the code switching paper. Instead of taking tests, reading textbooks, and filling out worksheets, we had the chance to do something different and get outside "our own little bubble". I'm sorry that you did not get what you wanted out of this class, but in my opinion, it was nice to learn skills like being able to present or better analyze text instead of memorizing dates or numbers for the next test.

That's all I got :). Thanks for reading and I hope this issue can somehow be resolved for you two and anyone else in your position.

Jonathan J said...

Lot's of interesting stuff here. I can identify with many of this class's own "minority" groups. I noticed this year much of what you did. We were taught what I would like to call a "revised revisionist's history". This references the many times that what we had learned in our past history courses was called just "revisionist's history". I agree that this class was extremely one sided. I agree that if you differed with the teacher you were mocked. A lot of times, facts used by the opposing side were stated in a sarcastic tone to make the class laugh and then dismiss the fact just because the teacher said it in a funny way. It would have been a much more enjoyable and educational experience had the two teachers seriously attempted to AOS (Adress the Other Side). Sadly, whenever there was an AOS it was just said as a joke and then laughed at. Both of the teachers are great people and meant well, but in the end I would have to agree with a lot that is said here.

William E. said...

I might as well take a stab at this discussion... I felt this year was the first time i was really able to think for myself. The first semester taught me to not always believe what others are saying but also that having and consulting sources and a multitude of sources is key. The death of Bolos paper definitely triggered this and I feel it is a skill that makes me look at the world around me much more differently. I think this skill definitely helped me and others to now formulate our own opinions.

Before this year, in most english and history classes we discusses the actions of characters throughout history, whether fiction or non-fiction. This year the focus seemed to be placed more on the students. Because of this, students in our class were able to think of things and seem both sides of an issue that we hadn't seen before. For example, the 9/11 pictures that we analyzed a loonnggg time ago showed that not everything has just once concrete story to it and if you dont know the facts, the interpretations to an event are seemingly endless. This allows students to formulate thier own opinions and thus understand who they are more, which is incredibly important.

I think you can look at this year as you want it. You can treat it like your opinions and culture were made fun of and mocked (which i'm still not convinced they were) or you can look at it as a positive experience like myself where i was able to learn to think critically for myself and think about why things are the way they are; cause wasn't that the point of the course anyway??

Ben W. said...

While your obvious patriotism is touching, I find your criticism of our class's curriculum to be pretty short-sighted. Like Callie said in her comment, it shouldn't come as much of a surprise that we often discuss our country's socioeconomic/ race/ gender inequalities, considering how hugely those topics relate to America's history and future. I believe that one of the main reasons we spent so much time discussing these issues was help us learn just how integral these inequalities are to shaping how our country looks today. For example, although you seem pretty convinced that gender inequality is an issue of a past, it factors heavily into so much of our country's history that not learning about it would provide us with an idealized picture of American history .

I found it funny that you should say we learned little that would produce an educated generation. When I (and many others, I'm confident) think of typical history courses we've taken in years past, I generally think of us memorizing facts about wars that we wouldn't remember two weeks later. That's not to say we did not ever memorize facts, because that was definitely a big part of projects like the civil liberties presentations. However, learning about these wars' relation, to say, those inequalities you criticized earlier helped me form what I believe to me a more educated version of our country's history. In the long run, I think learning about things like the prison industrial complex and our country's war on drugs will prove far more important and educational than knowing the name of some general who helped the United States win a battle (even if we were fighting for a just cause).

Your point about Christianity seems like it's answered in the course's title: AMERICAN Studies. Not only is more than 70% of our country Christian, but the foundations of America have strong ties to the religion. Why is it portrayed in a negative light? I would think that this has a lot to do with the religion having a pretty negative history. Ya, we could have read The Crucible and decided that Christianity wasn't an incredibly negative force for much of our country's history, but somehow I don't think that Arthur Miller intended to spread that message. Of course, that's not to say other religions don't have equally regrettable histories, and my goal is definitely not to target Christianity while supporting other religions. We could have easily spent time on the Buddhists and Muslims killing each other in Sri Lanka, but I hardly think that it would be as applicable to an American history course as issues dealing with the country's major religion.

I don't know why you think we have been encouraged in any way to feel guilty about our race and economic statuses. If you choose to feel guilty about these qualities, that's truly unfortunate for you. Maybe we should've skipped over our discussions about the country's racist drug laws so you can sleep soundly at night, but personally, I found it extremely important that we discuss the inequalities mentioned earlier, despite the fact that us generally white and upper-class students will realize our benefits in our country.

Ben W. said...


I don't even really want to get into your claim that women have enough rights here because other countries are even worse off. That logic is almost as flawed as your claim that women have equal rights in America.

Lastly, this post reminded me of an activity we did the first week of school, in which we analyzed the word choice of "An American Studies". One of the meanings we had found was the emphasis on the word AN. In the very name of the blog, it seems clear that the teachers realize that our curriculum was just one of many interpretations of our country. Personally, I'm grateful that the year we got was a unique one in which we learned how to think critically about America, not another year of learning how many wars we've entered in the past two centuries. It's a bummer that this isn't the interpretation you would've preferred... it seems your "bubble" was just impenetrable.

PDF said...

Though Ben said most of the things that needed to be said about this post, I'd like to add a bit about your claim that the class is too "one-sided," which seems to be the biggest issue you take with the class.

I think by now it's clear that both Mr. O'Connor and Mr. Bolos take a pretty liberal stance on political issues, and Mr. O'Connor has hinted several times that he has some issues with Christianity. Those are THEIR views, and they believe very strongly in them. And sometimes it's hard for a person who believes strongly in something to see things from the other side (you've demonstrated that in this somewhat close-minded blog post.) But that's why we have a discussion based class. If you hear anything you think is wrong or disagreeable, you can raise your hand and voice your concerns. As a person with liberal tendencies and an atheist, if I were in a class with a teacher who criticized my (lack of) faith and political views with misinformation, I would raise my hand and say something. And believe me, when the topic in the class came to Christianity and Mr. O'Connor cracked a joke, I could look over and see a look of contained anger on either of your faces. But I don't believe I ever saw you raise your hand to question this. Not once. And I would've remembered, because my hand would have shot up right after you made your point.

O'Connor and Bolos didn't make the class one-sided; you two did. Providing any evidence in favor of Christianity or against the idea of equal rights for women (which you seem to think doesn't matter) would have brought up an "interesting" discussion, and a heated one at that. But you never spoke up with one of these points. You get out of the class what you put into it, and I don’t think y’all put too much in.

Unknown said...

Ben, I am so glad that your bubble is burst. Really, I am. Actually, I have been trying to burst my bubble for many years now, although it doesn’t seem to be working. Picture this, six-year old Madeleine playing in the dirt alongside children who do not know where their next meal is coming from in Juaraz, Mexico. Second picture, summer before freshman year, Madeleine volunteering in an orphanage in Kabali, Uganda instead of tanning on the Wilmette beach. Final picture, Madeleine is going off to study abroad in Lima, Peru for her entire sophomore year by herself. Not to mention that both Reilly and I moved into the North Shore bubble in 2011; I was born and raised in Broomfield, Colorado and Reilly in Huntley, IL. I have been really trying to burst my bubble for years now, but it seems as if I have made no progress. I am open any suggestions you are willing to provide.

During these times abroad, I realized that every country has their own set of problems, and believe it or not, THERE IS NO UTOPIAN COUNTRY. No matter how many regulations you put on things, there is always going to be some idiot who screws over the entire system.

It would be naive to think that the United States is a land of equalities, that is that inequalities don’t exist. Again, no one is claiming this. However, legally we are supposed to be guaranteed equal rights among all types of people. According to The Constitution (which most classes memorized and had a big test on) EVERYONE has the same rights. Black, white, hispanic, Muslim, Christian, male, female, rich or poor. Now, the problem is that people tend to show favoritism, whether they mean to or not. For example, let’s say that you are a businessman and you were in a fraternity in college. You go to play a round of golf with your buddies, and someone decides to bring a friend along. That friend needs a job, and he just so happens to share a thing in common with you, the fraternity. You also have an open position in your firm. Who wouldn’t help out their “bro”? While this choice may not be “fair” (fairness dictates that everyone should have an “equal” shot at the position), we must accept that because of the free market system, many opportunities in our country simply arise because of connections. Guess what? He might not be the most qualified. Something else? Women aren’t in fraternities. Furthermore? Most of the time, I would argue that golf is a sport played by upper class citizens. It is impossible to regulate these types of situations.

Even if the Christian population and/or doctrine has many flaws, which I am not denying, it is not acceptable for the teacher to openly chaff those who practice this religion. The snarky comments made by our teachers were unnecessary and frankly uncalled for.

You can sleep soundly now Ben, because I don’t feel guilty about my socioeconomic class, not one bit.

Unknown said...

Again, I am grateful that we learned about different perspectives on our history and how inequalities played into that role. However, I think it is only fair for the whole history to be covered when taking an American history course. What about the end of WWII? Does the Marshall Plan ring a bell? The part that this course “forgot” to mention was how generous our country has been over the course of history.

I’m glad that you find our patriotism touching. Look out for us on the Fourth of July, we will be seeing the documentary titled, “America, Imagine the World Without Her” so that we can get a better sense of the difference that our country has made on a global scale. You are officially invited to join, so that you too, may benefit from seeing a different “one of many interpretations of our country.” We really don’t want there to be hard feelings between us and any one of our peers. Please, watch the trailer here (hyperlink to http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/01/26/check-out-new-trailer-for-dinesh-dsouza-film-america/)

Dear all, I am not the type of person who always needs to have the last word in a discussion. Feel free to keep commenting, as I truly enjoy reading this lively conversation. However, with finals and other commitments, it is hard to find time to respond to all comments. Thank you and see you Monday!

William E. said...

Hi, its me i'm back again
So I ended up reading all these comments and kind of just letting it sit in my head to think for a while and this is what i came up with:

First i thought about what history really is because this post tends to deal more with the history side of the course so ill just touch on the subject. History to me, is the study of past events. Fairly simple to understand right? Ok, but I still think there is another part of history that is often overlooked and that is that we learn things and remember certain events in history so they dont happen in the future.

Sure this year, we didnt learn the main general for the USA in the war of 1812 or how many soldiers died at Normandy on D-day but honestly other than historians, who is that information useful to. There is never going to be a point in your life unless you are on wheel of fortune or something where you need to know random facts about American history. I think as a history major in college and then later a history teacher, Mr. Bolos recognized that and thus him and OC changed their course to focus more on the effects/impacts events have on people on the country as a whole.

I said this in my comment above, but this year taught me so much on how to think for myself on assignemtns in class rather than filling out hundreds of notecards for a scantron test with facts that would leave my mind the day the final school bell ran for the year.

I think you guys choose to look at this class as a negative because at some times, and those times were rare, you felt your opinions and beliefs were contradicted. Personally if you go through life feeling bad for yourself, you wont be happy. Look at all the good things that you got out of this class and if you still dont think you bettered your self throughout the whole year than I think you should have dropped the class as soon as your ideals were contradicted in class.

PDF said...

Madeleine - I know your comment wasn't directed at me, but I'm throwing in my two cents anyway.

I ask you, as Will did, what good does learning about the Marshall Plan do? You're obviously already aware of it, as I'm sure many of our classmates are, so learning about it again would just be redundant. And to what avail? So we can pat ourselves on the backs, ignore the issues facing us today, and say, "Wow, isn't America swell?" This class armed us with knowledge and prepared us to be aware of/help to fix the problems with our country today, and connected these issues to things in the past; showing us America's "cyclical" nature. All of that; that is learning in its truest sense, not knowing how much money America threw at Europe after we destroyed it.

Also, as you've invited Ben (and anyone reading your comment) to watch your pro-America film, I'd like to invite you to read Christopher Hitchens' novel "god is not Great: How religion Poisons Everything" (god is lowercase for a reason.) I think you'll enjoy it about as much as I'll enjoy your film.

Will Errath - Spot on.

Unknown said...

Listen. This is why America is truly great, no? Everyone can say what they like, and it can be discussed to the point of oblivion without much consequence.

I would, however, like to urge people to understand that...well to speak frankly: we don't understand the Liberals mentality and Liberals don't understand ours. It's pretty simple to understand that notion. And so, I would ask people to be more understanding here so as no one feels uncomfortable.

Anyhow-- I wonder why it is okay to have one opinion, a more liberal one, but when we have ours, it is wrong? Is that not contradicting everything everyone has said that we've been taught thus far?

I am personally getting very tired of this...it's mentally exhausting really that people cannot understand, but I do not regret these exchanges. In fact, I am very proud to know that we can speak like this with each other in such a thoughtful and academic way.

And I just have to say, I apologize: America is "swell." And I will say this for the very last time also: We recognize America's wrongdoings but why must we focus purely on those?
I was not looking for a class that would spoon feed me a bunch of facts, which is why I DO appreciate this class. But it is purely the fact that nothing else was focused on. It is very important to speak about these ordeals, such as racism in America, but I simply do not agree with the whole year being based upon that, gender, and class alone.

Also, Will-- Yes, history is the study of past events but there is something you forgot. History is very impure in actuality. It is past + interpretation and so it is very crucial to receive all possible viewpoints so that the receiver of the information may make the decision as to which viewpoint he or she believes. And that is 100% okay that people have different opinions. Again, I love that about this country.

But in all honesty, we are conservative. The majority of you are seemingly liberal and we might never see eye to eye. And that is something I'm okay with; something I can actually be proud of all of us for. I am very sincere in saying that.

PDF said...

Reilly - It's not that I'm not ok with you having your opinion. Of course, I may disagree with it, and I'm willing to have a discussion about that. What prompted me to become somewhat hostile was the fact that you and Madeleine wrote your post in a hostile manner. You started off the post asking if the reader had ever done something they regretted or were embarrassed about, implying you felt that way about the class. You also said "We have learned little...this year in American Studies that would produce an educated generation," which is just untrue. I was angry because I feel that this was one of the best classes I've ever had at New Trier, with some of the most informative teachers I've ever had, and you tried to claim that it did nothing to teach people, and I felt personally hurt by that.

Perhaps you're right, that you will never understand my point of view (which, by the way, really has nothing to do with liberalism,) and I will never understand yours. I think that I'm right, you think that you're right. But I'd encourage you to take a step back. Step out of the "America is swell" mindset for one second, and try to see how this class has given people knowledge that, if they hadn't taken the course, they would've never had the opportunity to receive.

Unknown said...

This will be short because I have to attempt to re-teach myself an entire semester of chemistry but:
The beginning of the post was talking about how America has had its downs but we should not talk about them every single day that passes, just as if something wrong you'd done in your past may not be brought up every day of your life. Ya feel?

Know also, that I fully respect your opinion and I apologize if you felt that way. Though we too felt "personally offended" when our views were mocked.

We have looked at the "America has not always been 'swell'" POV many times, and I do not understand why you cannot understand that while there is more out there, this was the only POV that was taught. We just thought it was unbalanced. We would have liked to hear everything we've talked about the entire plus some is all.
But anyhow: Agree to disagree :)

Unknown said...

From an outside point of view I have heard a lot about this class from different students currently taking the course.That being said, many different perspectives have been brought to my attention and because this specific blogpost was sent to me I am just offering my opinion. First of all, I would like to address the comment about how the teachers enforced their opinions in the class. As a student who has attended new trier for a good 3 years, I would like to comment on the fact that most teachers are not keen on giving their political standpoints/views to their class. The reason for this? The CONTROVERSY that most likely ensues after an opinion is given by a teacher in the class. Not just in the history realm but also in Biology where science is put head to head with religion, most teachers give a disclaimer before talking about evolution. This is because they understand the problems to arise if they highlight one way of thinking as "right" and one way as "wrong". Teachers should stay neutral! Secondly, I would like to also comment that the US is not exactly equal in womens' rights. Yes, there is still a pay gap and yes, there are much more men than women in the US government. But after this fact, you learn to move on. Maybe learn about the progress people have made up to this point! Because isn't that what we at least owe to the people who have gotten us this far? And also learning about not only the issues of today but the issues of yesterday could help people understand one, not to repeat what happened back then and two, respect the place they are in. While acknowledging the bad aspects of an issue, acknowledging the good could also be beneficial for students to see once in a while.

Anonymous said...

If I could I would just like to respond to one thing that Reilly said which was when you said, "why must we purely focus on Americas wrongdoings?" Personally, in every history class I have been, I have maybe talked about something America did wrong for an unbelievably small percentage of the time we had. Michael Jordan once said, "I've failed over and over and over again in my life and that is why I succeed.” Although this quote is talking about basketball, I believe it applies in this instance as well. I feel like being taught the mistakes we have made in the past was in most cases more beneficial to my learning than learning about the successes over and over. As Preston said it is important to learn how of fail, so you can succeed, which I completely agree with. So overall, I did in fact feel I learned a lot in this class. Sure, we maybe should've focused a bit more on the positives, but for me it was very beneficial to learn about something I had never learned before, the failures and the páginas en blancos that the United States has had.

S. Bolos said...

Wow. Really impressed with this impromptu discussion. I hope it stays as civil as I have read (most of the time, at least).

Now I realize that you (we) all have other things to do (like Chemistry, huh, Reilles? ;) but I thought I would challenge you all to read my latest post because I think it relates to at least some of what's been brought up here.

You are not the first nor I imagine will you be the last class to broach this important issue, so kudos to you all. And now, back to work!

Unknown said...

I love that you guys (Reilly and Madeleine) put yourselves out there and took a risk writing this post, that's bold and I respect that, but I do have some problems with it, like everyone is entitled to have. I know a lot has been said already in previous comments but I just wanted to weigh in. I too at first felt a little like a "fish out of water" in this class without the usual textbook readings and lectures but then I really began to love coming everyday because everyday I learned something about this country that I had never known before. I learned the controversy and the behind the scenes things they don't announce on the news everyday. Especially in the paginas en blanco project every presentation was something shocking and sometimes horrifying, but also very interesting. But nothing is perfect and I love the chance to learn about the secrets that America doesn't want you to know because I feel that that is something citizens should have a right to know. We have to accept our flaws or else they will never be fixed. My political viewpoints do not matter because I am not here to criticize or sway anyone else's but I do have one thing to say about the points you made.

On the topic of women being equal in America, you do make a valid point that compared to many 3rd world countries, women in this country have it all, however we cannot ignore the fact that nothing is perfect and although we have made progress we are far from the finish line with gender equality. I have made many blog posts on the subject so feel free to check out my blog if you wish but in the workplace we are far from equal. I do not think that just because other countries are worse off in the area of gender equality, means that we should halt our progress and wait for them to catch up.

Anyway thanks for sharing your opinion guys, it sparked a great discussion.

Ben W. said...

Madeline (now that some much needed studying is out of the way)-

I'm glad that you don't feel guilty about your socioeconomic class, because you shouldn't. I think the main thing I'm taking issue with is how you seem to think that this course's goal was to make us feel guilty about our race or class. "If you are white, be prepared to feel guilty about your race"? Would you prefer that the curriculum ignores the countless instances in which white people see benefits in America that minorities don't? I think very few (if any) kids came out of this class feeling anything but educated, and if you thought that learning about these inequalities was a clever way to make us all feel guilt, I think you're way off. Maybe learning about things like the War on Drugs wasn't meant to make us feel ashamed of our race, but instead educate us about the environment we live in? It would've been great to kick back and think that white people have a spotless history, maybe while tanning on the Wilmette beach or something... but I feel pretty satisfied with the topics we chose to cover.

Still, I think you make a good point about instances in which you've seen the world around you. I'm sure those experiences have given you a view of the world that I have yet to see. However (and I could easily be wrong), it sounds like learning about the world through your experiences and learning about our country's history in our curriculum might have some differences- both of them involve bursting our bubbles, but maybe not in the exact same context.

Jonathan J said...

I love these debates

Shannon said...

I appreciate that you two were ballsy enough to write something as controversial as this, and while I don't agree with all of it, some of it rings true. My parents are catholic and while I am not particularly religious, I certainly believe that they are decent people. I sometimes feel a little like the teachers are putting down all of Christianity without remembering that we are all human in some way or another. The women's rights thing is tricky. In context of America, things could definitely be better but compared to a place like Saudi Arabia, where we can't even drive, we seem pretty good. I have actually complained about not getting enough basic educational history, but I don't mind some of the the things I've learned in this class. As for targeting us for our race and class, I don't think that we're meant to feel bad, I just think we're supposed to empathize with others and remember how lucky we are to be white and upper-middle class.

Unknown said...

Talk about some low blows, you guys both bring some valid points though. However, I find this post highly ironic in that you claim we haven't learn anything positive about America thus far. Every year I've taken a history course, I feel I've only learned the "whitewashed" history that all textbooks teach, the repeated topics we discovered while analyzing textbooks earlier in the year. We talk about slavery and the CRM and that's it. This year is the ONLY year where I believe we've truly covered a much broader and unbiased spectrum. We definitely talked about some positive aspects of American history, one of the most important components of our course is addressing the other side. Our Perilous Times project, and many others throughout the year, have been very open ended- meaning it was up to you guys to find the positive stuff. I hope you both don't find this year as time wasted, because I thought this has been a great course overall, and I definitely feel like it hasn't been time wasted.