Exhibition and cognitive dominance

"Those who have information to display typically control the form and content of its presentation, and they may have the power and resources to impose their conception of "needed information" on others. This dominance is a particular problem within the exhibition stance because it is less obvious: Analysis, identification and moral response are recognized as social constructions, but information that is simply displayed can take on the appearance of a natural, inevitable, or objective representation of the world."

Teaching History for the Common Good, pg. 121

Barton and Levstik

This passage from Teaching History for the Common Good’s chapter on the exhibition stance explains both the power and the danger inherent in the exhibition stance of history. Historical displays and exhibitions, when created to help others understand “what happened,” can be very powerful and can leave lasting impressions on consumers of those displays. This is, of course, the intention of the creators of these displays; museum curators, monument and memorial designers, and those responsible for education centers at major historical sites, do not go through all the trouble of creating thoughtful displays in order to not leave an impact on visitors. That said, there is significant danger posed when visitors accept these displays, and the information and narratives the displays contain, in an uncritical way. As Barton and Levstik explain, the other historical stances are obviously social constructions, and are also clearly value laden. When history is displayed as product, however, students and others often believe that what is displayed is ‘what happened.’ In many ways, this overlaps with Bruce Lesh’s observation that students often believe that bias is something to be eliminated, that there is an irreducible truth to be found in examinations of the past. Again, this is not limited to young people. Adults frequently complain that the media is full of bias and that they just want newspapers and other outlets to “report the facts.” This fails to recognize that even something as cut and dry as an AP bulletin has a point of view and is the product of authorial and editorial choices.

It is both difficult and important to identify ways to help students (and others) critically engage with the products of museums and other organizations. James Loewen, in Lies Across America, offers ten questions to ask at a historical site. (http://sundown.afro.illinois.edu/content.php?file=liesacrossamerica-tenquestions.html These help students interact in a more meaningful way with sites and museums. I have used modified versions of these questions when accompanying students to Jamestown, Williamsburg, Gettysburg and other historical sites. They definitely help students to peel back the gloss of these sites and consider what narratives are presented, whose views are valued and what intentions the site’s creators may have had. With middle school students, more simple and open-ended questions and thinking routines are appropriate. In our (Close Up’s) approach to the three memorials at the western end of the National Mall, we use a slightly modified version of the see, think, wonder routine to help students consider what message(s) is (are) sent to visitors by these memorials. While it is easy to approach memorials, and particularly war memorials, with a level of reverence that (while not necessarily inappropriate) makes it difficult to think clearly, it is useful to consider the German word for memorials: denk mal (which roughly translates into thought object).

That said, there is reason to fear that historical displays are getting ever more sleek and seductive. In Washington, DC, there are two great museums that exemplify this concern: the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and the Newseum. While the Holocaust Museum affords visitors an intense experience, and opportunities to reflect on the Holocaust in varied and meaningful ways, it is so well put together that it is very difficult to “pull back the curtains” and think about the choices made by creators and curators. The Newseum affords almost no opportunity to think critically about the role of the press in a democracy; instead, it celebrates the press and offers hagiography. While there is much to admire in the American media landscape, there are also serious deficiencies (reporting on drones, civilian casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan and the rationale for being in Iraq in the first place, just to name a few). That I like the Holocaust Museum and am disappointed by the Newseum speaks only to my bias; there are countless other sleek historical products available for students to consume all across the country, from the innocuous (the Experience Music Project) to the potentially harmful (the U.S. Constitution Center [where visitors literally drown in the progress and freedom narratives] and the aforementioned Newseum). It is becoming increasingly difficult for the field of critical pedagogy, underfunded and inward looking as it is, to keep up.

Seductive narratives

Ultimately, this reliance on narrative simplification diminishes the potential of history as preparation for democratic citizenship within each of the four stances: It can lead students to narrow their conception of what counts as a "true" American, to dismiss the suffering of victims of progress, to omit important information from historical displays, and to misconstrue the causes and consequences of historical events.

Keith Barton and Linda Levstik

Teaching History for the Common Good

pg. 146

In this passage, Barton and Levstik succinctly lay out their concerns about the overuse of narrative in history and social studies instruction. Specifically, they argue that the overuse of narrative diminishes the ability of students to think critically about counter-narratives, meaningful relationships between structures and characters outside the articulated narrative and those within it, and about the efforts necessary to achieve a result that the narrative may construe as inevitable. Additionally, narratives, because of their tidiness and their tendency to highlight progress, leave little room to examine the lives of those who may have been harmed or left out by the ‘progress’.

The sense of inevitability that narrative can create obscures the work of citizens in the struggle to create meaningful change. It also hides the work of those who may have actively sought to oppose those changes. For example, the efforts of those who opposed the civil rights movement, such as newspapers, business owners, state officials and the FBI, are little mentioned during most narratives about the work of Martin Luther King, John Lewis, Roy Wilkins and others. While it is not a fundamental demand of democratic education that students spend massive amounts of time studying the misdeeds of businesses and institutions (although to the extent that those institutions continue to exert influence in U.S. democracy, this would not be a waste of time), it is important that students evaluate the interests and tactics of those who shape government decision making. Narratives obstruct this effort.

Although I have spent a bit of time thinking about the danger of oversimplified narratives, of dominant narratives and of the ‘wrong’ narratives, I had never previously stopped to consider that narratives themselves, if overused, could pose a risk. That the narratives commonly used in history courses tend to damage students ability to think critically is hardly surprising; that the use of narratives generally causes us to think in a certain way, to react a certain way to a set of data and events, is troubling.

However, the focus on ‘thinking like a historian’ may not be sufficient to correct this problem. In many ways, thinking like a historian is about constructing narratives. That Lesh does not tell his students the stories of history is assuredly a step in the right direction. However, most of the examples offered in his book, Why Won’t You Just Tell Us the Answers shift the burden of narrative making from teacher or text to students. This does not mean that students are likely to become less focused on narratives. While understanding that there can be multiple narratives that explain the same event(s) is a positive step, the ability to stand back, to examine the state of affairs in a given situation, is not likely to be enhanced by Lesh’s approach.

Perhaps instead of thinking like a historian, students should be aided in thinking like citizens. Citizens, in order to be effective, should engage in thinking about structures of power, of finance, of politics and of social order. Power mapping a community (or an era) would be a meaningful way to engage in the type of teaching common in Northern Ireland (where narrative is less central) while still keeping an eye on concerns of politics, power and democracy. Questions that drive historical thought are useful to guide the thought processes of citizens; however, an important question from law is often overlooked: cui bono?