Those who can, teach history
21–30 of 38 posts
Re: Those who can, teach history
#22Earlier quoted context omitted.
It is, but it is a useful question. What you really want is not resources by being able to meet a threshold for: - logic - critical thinking After that, depending on your particular bent, you want some facility with languages ( some already dead ). In other words, it genuinely may not be for everyone.
For someone not wishing to be an expert or read source material, like the OC, facility in languages is absolutely not necessary. And history absolutely is valuable and can be accessible to everyone.
Shrug. Little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Giving someone tools to create black hole does not ensure that they will be able to utilize that knowledge in a manner that.. is useful.
In other words, it may not be absolutely necessary, but it is.. not helpful to suggest accessibility is key. If anything, accessibility makes it dumber; not completely unlike systemD in linux. It serves a purpose, but it dumbs things down.
Re: Those who can, teach history
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
Honestly, just start with Wikipedia. It's better than most popular books and completely free. If you find yourself wanting something better, the next steps up are any of the numerous world history books from Oxford/Cambridge university presses. Beyond that you should really be picking more narrow areas/periods to go into.
Wikipedia is emphatically not the place to start for this field. For chemistry, physics, mathematics and parts of biology, sure - any field which has not (yet) been politicised generally is covered quite well on Wikipedia. History has always been politicised and coverage of historical subjects on Wikipedia reflects and is fully dependent on which faction has captured the subject at hand. Even the ('perennial') source…
The amount of politicization that happens on Wiki is vastly overstated and in my experience usually reflects the speaker not seeing their own political biases.
Take, for instance, approaching history from the perspective of seeking an "objective take". That's great if you want to be on the cutting edge of historical methodologies from the 1930s, but it's something we try to disabuse undergrads of today because it's not very useful. The modern view is that all histories are narratives and the job of the historian is to render our understanding of it as fully and fairly as possible. David Stack's paper is a pretty good introduction [0] to this idea.
And so, take a look at the Human History page on Wiki [1]. There are lots of things I disagree with (the use of the term "Hinduism" for LBA religion, the "Cradles of Civilization" view is a particular choice, etc), but it hits a lot of the right points as well. Seriously, you have no idea how few popular history sources almost completely forget that there's a world outside Eurasia. Frankly, the article as a whole is a perfectly adequate introduction to world history, with lots of branching-off points for the things that interest you.
You can choose to go beyond that with things like the 7.5 volume Cambridge World History series [2], but the sheer amount of text makes that terrible advice for most people. Nor can I recommend pop media because the media with the most production value is almost always the worst informationally.
[0] https://doi.org/10.1111/criq.12824
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_history
[2] https://www.cambridge.org/core/series/cambridge-world-histor...
Re: Those who can, teach history
#24Tangential, but what resources would you recommend for learning world history (preferably including the non-Western world as well)? For someone who is not aiming to be an expert or work with source records, but wants to improve their general awareness and erudition.
Not even kidding - the AskHistorians reddit. I use their Sunday digest links as a magazine: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/search/?q=title%3A%22... It's filled in both so many gaps and made me increasingly curious about many periods/places that I previously felt disengaged about -- and led to much more reading of actual history
I found this Chinese-Canadian history teacher's course on World Civilization to be interesting. His perspective is unique, no doubt due to his journey growing up a poor immigrant in Toronto, a Yale education, and years in China. His treatment seems to offer his Chinese students a western lense, while also revealing insight into Chinese understanding. He's a charismatic presenter.
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLREQ8S3NPaQvNTsYrqph8T4hn...
His more recent work has waded into more speculative and controversial subjects but I don't think his World Civ playlist is itself controversial.
Re: Those who can, teach history
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
For someone not wishing to be an expert or read source material, like the OC, facility in languages is absolutely not necessary. And history absolutely is valuable and can be accessible to everyone.
Shrug. Little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Giving someone tools to create black hole does not ensure that they will be able to utilize that knowledge in a manner that.. is useful. In other words, it may not be absolutely necessary, but it is.. not helpful to suggest accessibility is key. If anything, accessibility makes it dumber; not completely unlike systemD in linux. It serves a purpose, but it dumbs things dow…
Are you seriously suggesting that one can't learn Roman History without learning to read Latin? That it is better to be ignorant of history than read a few books?
Re: Those who can, teach history
#26Anyone have an archive link? Despite being a history teacher myself I don't have a historytoday login
By the way, you can simply input archive.today/archive.is/archive.ph before the link and it will either take you to the archived page, or let you archive a new one. Like: archive.is/https://www.historytoday.com/archive/making-history/those-wh...
Re: Those who can, teach history
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wikipedia is emphatically not the place to start for this field. For chemistry, physics, mathematics and parts of biology, sure - any field which has not (yet) been politicised generally is covered quite well on Wikipedia. History has always been politicised and coverage of historical subjects on Wikipedia reflects and is fully dependent on which faction has captured the subject at hand. Even the ('perennial') source…
The amount of politicization that happens on Wiki is vastly overstated and in my experience usually reflects the speaker not seeing their own political biases. Take, for instance, approaching history from the perspective of seeking an "objective take". That's great if you want to be on the cutting edge of historical methodologies from the 1930s, but it's something we try to disabuse undergrads of today because it's n…
I wish I could upvote this multiple times. However, I hope nobody takes away from this that all history is purely biased and therefore worthless. Reading a history book should be like having a conversation with a well-informed friend: you should expect them to get most things right, talk with others, and feel entitled to your own opinion. But you shouldn't ignore them because they might be wrong or stop talking to them because you differ with them, and definitely not assume you're smarter and more clear thinking than the expert.
Re: Those who can, teach history
#28Tangential, but what resources would you recommend for learning world history (preferably including the non-Western world as well)? For someone who is not aiming to be an expert or work with source records, but wants to improve their general awareness and erudition.
One more source to consider, if you find non-fiction dry (and if you do, I'd start by trying a different history book) is novels. Novelists like Rushdie, Heller, Solzhenitsyn, and a surprising number of sci-fi writers include a lot of history in their books. Clearly, these are not unbiased sources and can't be relied on as your only source, but often make for easy insightful introductions and/or immersive supplements. I'm not even talking about "historical fiction," though some of that is also good. For example, the book "The Killer Angels" about Gettysburg, is sometimes assigned reading in history classes.
Re: Those who can, teach history
#29Tangential, but what resources would you recommend for learning world history (preferably including the non-Western world as well)? For someone who is not aiming to be an expert or work with source records, but wants to improve their general awareness and erudition.
Pick a country that you've been to, or want to visit, and delve deep into its history: wars, neighbors, food, culture. Personally I find that a lot more interesting than the broad survey-type podcasts and courses.
And reading a history book while you're in the place makes both the book and the place more interesting.
Re: Those who can, teach history
#30> Person 1: Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach.
> Person 2: ...Are you trying to teach me something?