I hate the way most teachers teach medieval history.
They focus on Europe, and offer misleading information.
Take, for instance, books. Everyone knows there were few books in Medieval Europe. Why is this? The most common answer is that each book had to be copied by hand. I submit that this is wrong.
A "Great Library" in Paris of, I believe, the 1200s consisted of thirteen volumes. Why is this the case, when your average student in Cadiz, in then Muslim Spain, could easily have twice as many? WHy were books in England exceedingly rare when in Baghdad there were shops filled with hundreds? They say books were rare because they had to be copied by hand. They had to be copied by hand in Baghdad, too. Same with Cadiz.
Why is it that the Arab Empire was the intellectual superpower of the western world at the time, yet there is almost nothing about it in the NC World History curriculum? I was fortunate in having a teacher that taught about the rest of the world during the same time period.
Posted by steven (Member # 8099) on :
Sudden, unexpected overpopulation is the cause of the reversal from being an "intellectual superpower" to being a bunch of crazies. Overpopulation was brought on by the discovery of oil.
AS to why nobody teaches this, I learned it in college. I don't know why it isn't taught in high school in NC, but that's where I went to high school in the early 90s, and it wasn't taught then, either.
Posted by Threads (Member # 10863) on :
It depends on the school I guess. In my AP World History class last year there was much more focus on Asia and the Middle East than on Europe.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
I hate the way history was taught to me in high school too. But could you support a couple of your claims? Specifically, the one about the "Great Library" of Paris, and also the assertion that the average student in Cadiz having at least a couple dozen books in the thirteenth century?
Beyond that, I would suppose the focus is on Europe because Europe is where the ancestors of most Americans come from, and so they are teaching "their" history.
Posted by Carrie (Member # 394) on :
The great libraries of England and the monastic centers of continental Europe had more than thirteen volumes. I'd have to dig out my palaeography notes, but there were many more books. This even dates back to Charlemagne - his letters call for codification and correction of the books, and his traveling library had a couple hundred books.
That said, the teaching of history does depend on the school. We had ours separated by hemispheres and did them in different semesters.
Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
Icarus is right. The focus of History in Western Education is on the history of the majority, which is European. It cannot be denied that it is important to know the basis and history of the prevailing current in your society.
Things are beginning to change, though. Elementary educations often include basic introductions to the major ancient world cultures- Egypt, China, Rome, Greece, Sumer, Aztec, Maya. The high school World History I took focused on Europe but certainly allowed and encouraged us to explore the culture/area of interest of our choice in individual assignments and projects.
As the culture of your given area diversifies, the education will slowly diversify with it, keeping in mind the limitations of high school as a forum for teaching the entire history of the world. The courses offered at my school were Canadian History (domestic history), American History, World History and European History.
World History's goal was not to give us the entire history of the world, an impossible feat, but to give us the earliest important bits as relating to our culture, and then, like I said, allow people to explore the culture of their interest.
As for University, I've never taken a generalized "history" class (such as say "The History of Scientific Discovery") that wasn't prefaced by the statement "This is a history of <certain area>, we realise that it does not cover the entire world, but we will talk about related areas as they become important." Practicality unfortunately requires us to draw a line. Most historians are very aware that cultures tend to leech into each other, especially over thousands of years.
Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
quote:Take, for instance, books. Everyone knows there were few books in Medieval Europe. Why is this? The most common answer is that each book had to be copied by hand. I submit that this is wrong.
Also, if this is what your teachers are telling you, it is correct, of course, but as you pointed out, barely part of the story.
Keep in mind that High School history classes, unless you are exceedingly lucky, is really only an pale overview- often a somewhat incorrect or aged one- of the actual breadth of what is studied and argued and discussed and known and not known about the past by historians. It aims to give students an idea about the past so when they graduate they are not ignorant about key events.
I wouldn't consider myself and expert in anything, despite being a History Major (demonstrating how little it is possible to know unless you focus your study as you would in a graduate degree), but when it comes to post-Roman literacy and the number of books in Europe, it is important to remember how few people were literate. Due to the living conditions in Europe at the time, literacy was confined largely to the church in general and monasteries in particular, limiting not only the number of people able to copy texts but also the number of texts required.
As for your "hundreds of books" in Baghdad and Cadiz, I imagine that there was certainly more literacy in other areas which weren't decimated by invasion like Western Europe was until the 11th century, copying books by hand, especially considering the way they were illuminated, would still be a slow and expensive undertaking. I'm not saying that the East wasn't considerably further advanced in Science and Knowledge in that era (it certainly was), only that I think you are engaging in hyperbole both ways.
I would have to study the area much further in order to give a proper judgment.
Posted by Morbo (Member # 5309) on :
Steven, according to Psychology Today, it's not overpopulation but polygyny that accounts for the violent fanaticism in the Middle East.
quote: It is the combination of polygyny and the promise of a large harem of virgins in heaven that motivates many young Muslim men to commit suicide bombings. Consistent with this explanation, all studies of suicide bombers indicate that they are significantly younger than not only the Muslim population in general but other (nonsuicidal) members of their own extreme political organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah. And nearly all suicide bombers are single.
the decline of the Middle East as a powerbloc was caused by the age of nationalism and finalized in WWI when the Ottoman Empire fell apart. After which they were dominated by western powers for decades.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: the decline of the Middle East as a powerbloc was caused by the age of nationalism and finalized in WWI when the Ottoman Empire fell apart. After which they were dominated by western powers for decades.
Don't forget a floor mopping courtesy of Genghis Khan. There are still Muslims who complain that all the Muslim nations would have had nuclear weapons first were it not for the loss of knowledge incurred when Khan burned up their libraries and trashed Baghdad.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Edited for double post.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I don't buy that excuse. It happened so long ago, and it's not like Europe escaped devastation as well, especially considering the entire continent was leveled, and a great deal of intellectual power was destroyed in the early 20th century, and still they came out on top.
I think Teshi nailed it more on the head. Demand for books outside of monastic orders in Europe was small. Not many were literate, and even if you were literate, books were horribly expensive, which means you probably couldn't afford to buy one. That didn't change until Gutenberg came around.
I think it's almost impossible though to teach Medieval history without covering at at least the Middle East. The Crusades were central to much of European and Middle Eastern life for a couple centuries, and they were closely intertwined. Through that you should also come into contact with some Asian history too by way of the Mongolians and maybe even Timur.
Any teacher who leaves any of that out is doing a grave disservice, but then, I'm a big student of the Crusades, and love reading books about them. I almost feel like I'm reading the Silmarillion, the way grave missteps destroy the past heroics of great men and how petty rivalries come into play, there're a lot of similarities. It's a fascinating period of history.
Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
In every Medieval History course I've taken, the Middle East has been discussed within the context of the Crusades.
Posted by Starsnuffer (Member # 8116) on :
My history teacher this year began by saying that we'll be focusing on european history, but only because that is where the most was occuring during the time period we're studying, that the middle east and china and the like were more or less stagnant. That said, I feel my history class spends an appropriate amount of time on all pertinent regions to what we're studying, not inappropriately biased against non-europeans.
Posted by Temposs (Member # 6032) on :
quote: I don't buy that excuse. It happened so long ago, and it's not like Europe escaped devastation as well, especially considering the entire continent was leveled, and a great deal of intellectual power was destroyed in the early 20th century, and still they came out on top.
According to what I've learned in my current class(Transnational Islam, an Anthropology course) and a BBC documentary on Light, the dynamic advancement of the Christian World came about as a result of the period of The Enlightenment, which helped spur scientific discovery without the restriction of whatever the current religious perspective was on a given subject. This never caught on in the Muslim world, which caused them to be left behind.
The Arabs did lead the world for several centuries, though, with amazing European strongholds in Spain(Cadiz) and Italy(Sicily).
Islam is a religion that encourages profitable business, as Mohammed was a business man. They were rather tolerant of Jews(especially) and Christians for a long time as well. Muslims are forbidden from forcing conversion on Christians and Jews, on the principle that all three have the same spiritual lineage. These combined with a high regard for religious scholarship and vast wealth leads to a more general scholarship, I think.
But, the Muslim world didn't get an Enlightenment period, they instead got a strain of fundamentalism in the 19th century called Wahabism which is the official Saudi religious doctrine. There's also Salafi from the early 20th century who had some decent ideas but the adherents went away from his more liberal ideas so that it's basically equated with Wahabism these days.
An interesting point is that these fundamentalist movements differ from Christian fundamentalism in that while the Christians simply assert the Bible as the sole source of God's written revelation and decide all things on its principles, the Wahabists actually take it a step further, saying in effect that if Mohammed didn't do something, then any good Muslim today shouldn't do it. As you might imagine, this would stifle innovation quite a bit.
Of course, most Muslims are not Wahabists, although it seems that as with any religion, people create a spectrum of practice of their religion, which roughly may correspond to: liberal->conservative, nominal->religious, bad->good. So if you merge all these ranges onto one line, which is natural, then the Wahabists naturally seem to be moreso the devout good Muslims, even if you as a Muslim know they're the ones causing much of the war, terrorism, human rights abuses, etc.
A similar process may be used to assess the situation with Christians, where you might parallel fundamentalists advocating teaching Creationism in schools with the violent among the Wahabists, although of course I have no intention of implicating their actions are on the same level.
The flaw is the bad->good, which may cause especially an outsider to the religion to assess the entire religion negatively, since these people are supposedly practicing "correctly". It takes some education to learn that there are many other ways to practice the faith and that those are also "good" equally if not moreso.
Eep, I'm afraid I've gotten carried away Don't be angry with my off-topicness... Posted by Dan_raven (Member # 3383) on :
When I went to school, some decades ago, I got really upset about how History was taught.
We begin with Sumeria, mainly, I believe, because of Biblical influences. In other words both Pro-Christian and Anti-Christian teachers used the "Cradle of Civilization" to promote their point of view.
Then we jump to Egypt because everyone loves Pyramids and Mummies.
Then we jump to Greece because its the birthplace of Democracy. Persia gets a quick mention, as does Alexander the Great.
We went into detail of how Rome was formed, and suddenly they ruled the world.
Rome fell as barbarians invaded and leaded drinking cups caused insanity.
Puff, Europe as a group of Kingdoms was running. Europe, as we studied it during the Medieval times was England, with a bit of France and Italy. Italy being The Catholic Church and Rome, followed by Venice and the Renaisance.
Marco Polo is mentioned and we get told that a place called China exists.
Suddenly we are back in England where King Henry VIII marries a lot of women and breaks with Rome. Luther in Germany, which apparently is also in Europe, and has been a bit civilized since the days of Roman Barbarians, starts religious wars by a written complaint against the Catholic Church.
Spain and Portugal, apparently also part of the Europe thingy, (and no mention is made of their Muslim conquest--they are and always were strict Catholic) begin looking for better routes to the spice trade.
Here we are told that a place called India exists.
To get there the sailors sail around Africa. For the first time since Egypt is mentioned we are told that there is a place called Africa. For the first time we go south of the Dessert.
Columbus discovers America. The natives are either pleasant peaceful uncivilized victims or dangerous bloodthirsty empires that are quickly destroyed by European trickery and high explosives.
Here we discuss Aztec culture, Incan Culture, and the Mysterious Mayans. We are left with the impression that all such cultures were completely wiped out and that none of their descendants are left today. (wrong)
Back to Europe. Spain rules the America's and begins brutally enslaving and killing off the natives. Shame on them. They also have tons and tons of Gold from the Americas that they waste instead of becoming a more lasting world power.
Elizabeth is Queen, Shakespeare writes his plays, and Spain has an Armada. Then England starts colonizing the US.
We then go through US history. England is forgotten between Jackson's victory in New Orleans and WWI. Mexico is only mentioned briefly when Texas is annexed. Russia doesn't come into existence until WWI, and the only time any of Eastern Europe is mentioned is at the begining of WWI and the end of WWII. Japan--WWII. The Middle East? Only when Isreal is created.
Truly, the best World History I've read has been The Cartoon History of the World by Godkin. Its amusing and informative. I have to finish it next time I find it.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
The 'Islamic Golden Age' period was very arguably an enlightenment. That it was much earlier than Europe's and brought low by a world-crushing conqueror does not mean it did not exist.
Lyrhawn: the devastation of centers of learning involved in World War One was nothing in comparison to the depredations of the khanate empire. Institutions in states in Europe were left mostly intact after World War One. Also, saying Europe was set back from the Mongol Horde on anything like the level the Islamic world did is drastically incorrect. Mongol forces penetrated hardly at all into Western Europe, while they conquered by far most of the principle cities of the Islamic world.
Posted by Temposs (Member # 6032) on :
Dan_raven: That is exactly how I learned world history in high school as well. It seems to be the standard curriculum in the US. It certainly hasn't helped our current political situation that this is all of what 95% of our population knows(if that).
fugu: From how it's been presented to me so far, the "Muslim Golden Age" was certainly a time of great liberal thinking and discovery, and it was the equivalent of The Enlightenment in relation to its time period. So, that far along I agree with you.
But this Enlightenment never achieved the same separation between religion and science that the likes of Newton helped to create. The extent to which liberal thought was advanced in the Muslim World was an excellent necessary advance for the time far ahead of the Christian world, but they weren't able to take it further than they did. The Christian world is completely indebted to the Muslim academic accomplishments, but I think the western Englightenment took things a step further in the freedom allowed to intellectual thought and research.
That said, an interesting tidbit is that the most renowned Arab university, Al Azhar University in Egypt, forbids the wearing of hijab on its grounds.
Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
quote:I hate the way most teachers teach medieval history.
I'm not sure, but I think the terms "Medieval" and "Middle Ages" are actually applicable solely to Europe, which makes a class on the Medieval Ages by definition focusing on Europe.
Just to undermine the entire point of this thread.
Posted by Eaquae Legit (Member # 3063) on :
Well, there are actually a fair number of Arab/Muslim specialists, given the huge influence Muslim scholarship - especially the transmission of Classical literature - had in Europe, and the social interaction in Spain especially. There are even a handful of Oriental medievalists.
The topic is taught the way it is mostly for practical reasons. It's 1000 years and a whole freaking continent. That's a LOT of material to cram into 4 months. The Norman Conquest of England or the Crusades are a lot easier to explain to a class full of bored teenagers than the impact of Al-farabi's philosophy arriving in the universities of France and Germany. The crowning of Charlemagne is easier than Augustine's injunction to "slay them [the Jews] not." We teach the basic feudal model because you could spend an entire graduate-level course dissecting the actual workings of the system.
Books were precious, difficult to produce, expensive as all-get-out, difficult to read even for the literate, and demanded leisure time.
Whoever told you that the library in Paris only had 13 volumes better back that statement up with proof. I find it very, very hard to believe. Books were much more common among scholars, and everyone wanted a copy of the Good Stuff so they could write their own notes in the margins, write commentaries on them, reproduce them for their own pleasure. The 13th century saw an explosion of scholarship. Perhaps whoever told you that meant that only 13 volumes are still extant. That would make a LOT more sense.
Posted by Elizabeth (Member # 5218) on :
Books were expensive even after Gutenberg. And I mean expensive. A parent found a great link for me which compared what a dictionary cost to a person in the Middle Ages to what one would cost us now.
As for why history is taught the way it is.
Well, I would say there are a couple of reasons for that. One is time, the other is a lack of resources and technology.
I tell the students in my class to think of their text book as ONE resource of many, and not to think they are wrong if they find different information. Instead of teaching dates and facts, I try to teach them to be detectives, and to realize that they will find different facts and dates in their history. They need to piece it all together for themselves. The problem is, we don;t get a lot of time on the computers.
Then there are tests students have to take. A constructivist approach is wonderful in teaching history, but when they have to pass a state test with specific information, well, they have to learn the facts of the curriculum.
I just wish they would hurry up and invent one of those history videos that they had in "Pastwatch." It would make things so much easier! We wouldn't have to unwrap mummies and dig through garbage anymore.
Slackers.
Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
quote:Well, there are actually a fair number of Arab/Muslim specialists, given the huge influence Muslim scholarship - especially the transmission of Classical literature - had in Europe, and the social interaction in Spain especially. There are even a handful of Oriental medievalists.
I know, Eruve, but as you say, they talk about their area largely in relation to Europe.
quote:I just wish they would hurry up and invent one of those history videos that they had in "Pastwatch."
It would make my research essay so much easier. In fact, any time travel. Hop in, hop out, interview the natives (universal translator). A bit hard to source, though:
Smith, John (Winchester: The little man who sweeps the roads, 1456)
Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
quote:...especially considering the entire continent was leveled...
I dunno, I think the Alps are still there...
Posted by Dan_raven (Member # 3383) on :
The question is, do we teach children History to learn the facts, or to learn the creation myths of our secular governments? Is the purpose of History Class to tell how the world came to be as it is, or is the purpose to create good citizens, soldiers, and tax payers who believe in the myths of our countries creation and be willing to sacrifice as required to keep that country going.
Posted by orlox (Member # 2392) on :
If only history had a single purpose.
A comprehensive history, even of the past minute, is entirely impossible. Any history is essentially a narrative and suffers from the limitations of linear selection and presentation fundamental to that form. It is too bad, but if you are thinking in a known language then that fundamental limitation pervades your thoughts as well.
Certainly, the victor writes his story but it is not the only story. And no one story can contain all that there is to the truth. There are many truths out there, some flatly contradictory. There is no one narrative that tells "how the world came to be as it is" to the exclusion of all others.
So it is.
Facts don't just appear, unproblematic and with a pedigree of causation.
We always have to explain 'facts' and we have to explain them within the framework and limitations of human language.
No doubt, hegemonic narratives are self-serving and should be afforded skeptical consideration. But there is no pure, unproblematic history out there.
Unless you mean religion, of course.
Posted by Elizabeth (Member # 5218) on :
Dan,
It is amazing how much "myth" fifth graders come into my class with. It is also amazing how they can learn what really happened in a situation, or at least try to see a different side to the story.
Part of the problem teaching history to younger children is really time itself. I do not mean there is not enough time to teach. I mean the kids' sense of time is...young.
To hop from something orlox said, they are focused on the minutes surrounding their existence, and they can't even keep those straight! In fact, I use the getting-in-trouble-at-recess analogy a lot. Who saw it? Who decides which story is true? How does the truth change depending on how much is at stake for a person?
In some ways, I think it would be better to simply teach the detective nature of history to younger kids, and let them hunt for facts. Have them do simulations where they are making a colony, they are deciding on the way they want to be governed, etc. Then focus their learning later on.
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Don't be angry with my off-topicness... ![[Hail]](graemlins/hail.gif)
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