America: History and Memory (Hist. 590) Spring 2002
Dr. Jon Hunner 242 Breland Hall 646-2490 jhunner@nmsu.edu
Office hours: Tuesdays and Thursdays: 1:30-2:30
The America: History and Memory reading seminar focuses on several topics. First, we will investigate how Americans construct our historical memory. Second, we will explore the contested nature of contemporary history. Third, we will examine current issues in the historiography of public history. Fourth, we will examine the invention and re-invention of our nation’s history in the twentieth century.
Course Schedule
Jan. 10 Course Introduction
Jan. 17 Telling the Truth About History, pp. 1-159
Jan. 24 Telling the Truth About History, pp. 160-309
Jan. 31 Presence of the Past
Feb. 7 Memory and American History
Feb. 14 Seminar Reader
Feb. 21 History Wars
Feb. 28 Fallout
March 7 Mickey Mouse History
March 14 Preserving Memory
March 21 Time Passages
March 28 Spring Break
April 4 Carried to the Wall
April 11 Class canceled.
April 18 Historic Preservation
April 25 The Power of Place
May 2 Reclaiming Democracy
May 9. Take home exam due.
Readings
Joyce Appleby, Lynn Hunt, and Margaret Jacobs, Telling the Truth About History (New York: Norton, 1994).
Roy Rosenzweig and David Thelen, The Presence of the Past: Popular Uses of History in American Life (New York: Columbia University Press, 1998).
David Thelen, editor, Memory and American History (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1989).
Seminar Reader, available at The Print Shop, 1114 Espanola, 647-3424.
Edward T. Linenthal and Tom Engelhardt, editors, History Wars: The Enola Gay and Other Battles for the American Past (New York: Henry Holt, 1996).
Paul Boyer, Fallout: A Historian Reflects on America’s Half-century Encounter with Nuclear Weapons (Columbus: Ohio State University Pres, 1998).
Mike Wallace, Mickey Mouse History and Other Essays on American Memory (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1996).
Edward T. Linenthal, Preserving Memory: The Struggle to Create America’s Holocaust Museum (New York: Penguin Books, 1995).
George Lipsitz, Time Passages: Collective Memory and American Popular Culture (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1990).
Kristin Ann Hass, Carried to the Wall: American Memory and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998).
Diane Barthel, Historic Preservation: Collective Memory and Historical Identity (New Brunswick:Rutgers University Press, 1996).
Dolores Hayden, The Power of Place: Urban Landscapes in Public History (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997).
Meta Mendel-Reyes, Reclaiming Democracy: The Sixties in Politics and Memory (New York:Routledge, 1996).
Grading
Class participation 15%
Written questions (3 written questions about each week’s reading
are due by 5 p.m. that day. Submit them by e-mail or in my mailbox) 30%
Book reviews (3 book reviews required-- two from the readings
before Spring break, and one from the readings after the break.
Book reviews are due at the beginning of the class period
on the day the book is assigned.) 30%
Take home exam (due May 9th). 25%
Course Guidelines
Lack of attendance will affect your final grade.
Withdrawals from this course are the responsibility of the student.
An incomplete will be given only if the student has passed the first half of the course and can not complete the course due to documented illness or family crisis.
Academic misconduct in this course will cause the student to fail the course. Please consult the Student Code of Conduct in the NMSU Student Handbook.
Students with disabilities are encouraged to identify their status by providing documentation from the Office of Disabled Students.