2008 Woodie Awards
Quid rides? De te fabula narratur. (What are you laughing at? The joke's on you.)
The Case for History
ANTHONY ASCHETTINO, OBSERVER STAFF WRITER
Issue date: 10/7/08 Section: Observations
One of the first obligations of any society, immediately after such a thing as ensuring the safety of the society, should be looking after the welfare of the next generation.
This impulse can be seen at all levels of any civilized society: parents (or at least any parent worth their salt) will gladly give their life to protect their children, and of all the crimes humans may commit against one another the lowest ranks in our prisons are reserved for those who have committed offenses against children.
It is not surprising, then, that during the current election cycle, both candidates are talking about the need to invest in the future by improving education and issues such as health care, both of which are critical for the development of America's youth.
Yet when it comes to discussing education, the subjects mentioned are always the same: science and math. This is not terribly surprising, since America is a land that values technological improvement and has long been the vanguard when it comes to the development and expropriation of technology in all disiplines.
During a time of increasingly complex threats in fields such as medicine and warfare one could forgive this emphasis on those subjects which seem to promise the most advancement against such problems. The general failing in such a mode of thought, however, is the subjugation of history to a second tier when it comes to the subjects stressed in schools and in the general public.
History is a most contentious subject precisely because of its very nature: it is unlike math in that it is filled with debatable arguments instead of concrete proofs, and unlike science in that there are some areas against which no amount of experiments can prove anything conclusively; of all the subjects studied there is perhaps only one in which more conflicting ideas can be held and accepted as legitimate, and religion itself is a product of and falls into the realm of history.
It is malleable in many ways: nobody can argue, for example, that the Roman Empire fell; there are dozens of theories about why it fell, when it fell, and how it fell, and most of these are legitimate because they are not exclusive to one another.
This impulse can be seen at all levels of any civilized society: parents (or at least any parent worth their salt) will gladly give their life to protect their children, and of all the crimes humans may commit against one another the lowest ranks in our prisons are reserved for those who have committed offenses against children.
It is not surprising, then, that during the current election cycle, both candidates are talking about the need to invest in the future by improving education and issues such as health care, both of which are critical for the development of America's youth.
Yet when it comes to discussing education, the subjects mentioned are always the same: science and math. This is not terribly surprising, since America is a land that values technological improvement and has long been the vanguard when it comes to the development and expropriation of technology in all disiplines.
During a time of increasingly complex threats in fields such as medicine and warfare one could forgive this emphasis on those subjects which seem to promise the most advancement against such problems. The general failing in such a mode of thought, however, is the subjugation of history to a second tier when it comes to the subjects stressed in schools and in the general public.
History is a most contentious subject precisely because of its very nature: it is unlike math in that it is filled with debatable arguments instead of concrete proofs, and unlike science in that there are some areas against which no amount of experiments can prove anything conclusively; of all the subjects studied there is perhaps only one in which more conflicting ideas can be held and accepted as legitimate, and religion itself is a product of and falls into the realm of history.
It is malleable in many ways: nobody can argue, for example, that the Roman Empire fell; there are dozens of theories about why it fell, when it fell, and how it fell, and most of these are legitimate because they are not exclusive to one another.
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