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?