AARE-APERA 2012 Presentation
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Post-colonial
perspectives on the
historical narrative
Why we need a pedagogic
theory of historical
representation
Robert J. Parkes,
PhDUniversity of
Newcastle
Outl
ine:
Why
do w
e n
eed a
pedagogic
al
theory
of
His
tori
cal
repre
senta
tion?
What is the problem? How have we responded to
the problem? Why do we need to think
differently about the
problem?
What can we draw on that
will help us think differently?
What is the problem?
Navigating rival narratives
His
tory
Wars
Throughout the 1990s
Australia was in the grip of an academic,
political, cultural, and
curricular debate that
has become known as
the ‘history wars’. (Macintyre & Clark, 2003)
New
Vis
ions
of
the K
eati
ng
Era
The shift to a full-blown market economy
signified by the floating of the Australian
dollar;
The building of Republican momentum
towards the declaration of Australia as an
independent nation; The revisioning of Australia as part of Asia;
Calls for reconciliation with Australia’s
Indigenous inhabitants as a precursor to
moving forward as a nation. And increasing perceived
disenfranchisment of the White Anglo
male (partially related to the Recession we
had to have, and the feminism of the
1970s)
Revi
sions
and
React
ions
The central concern in
this debate centred on
representations of the
colonisation of Australia, and its interlocutors included
scholars, media commentators, and Prime Ministers on both sides of the political divide.
Dis
rupti
ng t
he G
reat
Aust
ralia
n S
ilence
Public awareness of a
distinctive Indigenous
perspective on Australian history appears to have arisen
partly as a result of a
series of grass roots protests that culminated
in a ‘day of mourning’
during the Bicentennial
celebrations of 1988.
(Reed, 2004)
Curr
iculu
m S
hift Invasion” as an
alternative to “peaceful settlement”
as a description of the
colonisation process.
(Land, 1994)
The A
ge o
f M
abo
The High Court’s Mabo
decision (and the Wik
decision that followed in
1996) forced the public to
confront the legal right of
Indigenous people to
dominion over their traditional lands (Ritter &
Flanagan, 2003). Resulted in political scaremongering by Howard
Government that suburbanites would have
their backyards re-possesed.
Att
wood (
1996)
Mabo and the new Australian history ends the
historical silence about the
Aboriginal pre-colonial and
colonial past upon which the
conservative invention of
Australia and Australianness
was founded, and since their
Australia was realised
through and rests upon that
conventional historical
narrative, the end of this
history constitutes for them
the end of Australia.” (p.
116)
The P
olit
ics
of
His
tory
Curr
iculiu
m
History curriculum is
perceived to act as an
apparatus for the social
re/production of national
identities, through linking
“the development of the
individual to the images and
narratives of nationhood.”
(Popkewitz, 2001) History education seen as
the vehicle for social
cohesion. (Howard, 2006)
How have we responded
to the problem?
Conti
nuin
g d
ebate
s ove
r cu
rric
ulu
m
conte
nt
Development of an Australian (national)
Curriculum
Howard’s (Sept 2012) Sir
Paul Hasluck Foundation
Inaugural Lecture call for “a
proper sense of history”. Not ‘black armband’ or
‘white blindfold’. (Gillard,
2010)
Why do we need to think
differently about the problem?
Conflict over rival narratives
reveals ‘representation’ as a
problem
His
tory
as
repre
senta
tion
historical discourse is in its
essence a form of ideological
elaboration” (Barthes,
1967/1997, p. 121) “the straightness of any story is a
rhetoric invention” (Kellner, 1989,
p. x)
historical narratives are artifacts
of an interpretive act constituted
in part by a historian’s aesthetic,
epistemological, and ethical
commitments, and in part by the
underlying tropic forms of
language itself. (H. White, 1973)
Anke
rsm
it (
2001)
Referential Statement vs Explanatory Narrative Histories are narratives that always
exceed the sum of their referential statements.
Revi
sion v
s D
enia
l
If you reject accepted
referential statements
then you are probably
engaging in historical
denial. (See Taylor, 2008 on
Windschuttle or Evans, 2002 on Irving) If you have accept
accepted referential
statements but generate
a different narrative, you
are probably engaging in
historical revision.
What can we draw on that
will help us think
differently?
Pedagogy as a process of
representation and reception
Why
a p
edagogic
al t
urn
is n
eeded in
His
tory
educa
tion
Pedagogy as a concept “draws
attention to the process
through which knowledge is
produced.” (Lusted, 1986) Shift from apprenticeship to
schooling created a problem of
representing knowledge and
practice. (Lundgren, 1991) Pedagogical Content
Knowledge is about having 150
ways of representing a
concept. (Wilson, Shulman, &
Richert, 1987).
Post
-colo
nia
l resi
stance
to
his
tori
cal
repre
senta
tion
InterpellationWe are acquiescent in the face of the grand
narrative of the nation.
Rejection / Interjection
We insert or juxtapose rival narratives of
the past.
InterpolationWe draw attention to the historical
narrative we are teaching as an artifice,
a representation (derived
from methodological, ethical and other
choices of the historian), a rhetorical
practice.
Ashcroft (2001)
Teach
er’
s M
eta
-Know
ledge:
Pedagogy
as
Repre
senta
tion
Collective Memory
(Reconstructionist)
THE story of the past
Interpellation Disciplinary
(Constructionist)
The BEST story of the past Postmodern
(Deconstructionist)
Only perspectives on the past
WHOSE story of the
past? Interjection
Seixas (1999)after Jenkins & Munslow (2004)
Why we need Historiography in Teacher Education (Parkes, 2011)
Metadisciplinary
(Deconstructionist)
How is the story being
constructed?
Interpolation
(Segall, 2006)
The E
nco
unte
r w
ith A
lteri
ty:
Pedagogy
as
Rece
pti
on
Ethnographic empathy
(Assimilation) Self-identification with a limited
conception of the other
(Romanticization / Fetishization)
Defensive skepticism
(Rejection / Demonization) Indifference, what does it have to do
with me?
(Disqualification) Be transformed by the stories of
others
(Transformation / Appropriation)
Simon (2005)Parkes (2004)
Cri
tica
l his
tory
pedagogy
Rival narratives necessary (and exciting) but insufficient.
Need to foreground the pedagogical processes of representation and
reception.
Refe
rence
s
Ankersmit, F. R. (2001). Historical representation. Stanford, CA:
Stanford University Press.
Attwood, B. (Ed.). (1996). In the age of Mabo: History,
Aborigines and Australia. Sydney: Allen & Unwin.
Ashcroft, B. (2001). Post-Colonial transformation. London:
Routledge.Barthes, R. (1967/1997). The discourse of history. In K. Jenkins
(Ed.), The postmodern history reader (pp. 120-123). London:
Routledge.Evans, R. J. (2002). Telling lies about Hitler: The Holocaust,
history and the David Irving trial. London: Verso.
Gillard, J. (2010). Students to learn 'balanced view of history'.
Retrieved from http://www.abc.net.au/news/2010-03-01/students-to-learn-bala
nced-view-of-history/2569490
Howard, J. (2006, 26th January). Unity vital in battle against
terrorism, The Sydney Morning Herald, p. 11.
Kellner, H. (1989). Language and historical representation.
Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.
Jenkins, K., & Munslow, A. (Eds.). (2004). The nature of history
reader. London: Routledge.
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politics. Brisbane: Queensland Studies Centre.
Lundgren, U. P. (1991). Between education and schooling:
Outlines of a diachronic curriculum theory. Geelong, Victoria:
Deakin University.
Lusted, D. (1986). Why pedagogy? Screen, 27(5), 2-14.
Macintyre, S., & Clark, A. (2003). The history wars. Melbourne:
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strategically mediated encounter with alterity. Paper
presented at the annual conference of the Australian
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Melbourne, 28 November - 2 December 2004.
Refe
rence
s (C
ont’
d)
Popkewitz, T. S. (2001). The production of reason and power:
Curriculum history and intellectual traditions. In T. S.
Popkewitz, B. M. Franklin & M. A. Pereyra (Eds.), Cultural
history and education: Critical essays on knowledge and
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memory in Australia. Crawley: University of Western Australia
Press.Ritter, D., & Flanagan, F. N. A. (2003). Stunted growth: The
historiography of native title litigation in the decade since
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anyway? In A. Segall, E. E. Heilman & C. H. Cherryholmes
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the postmodern (pp. 125-139). New York: Peter Lang.
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Studies, 31(3), 317-337.
Simon, R. I. (2005). The touch of the past: Remembrance,
learning, and ethics. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Taylor, T. (2008). Denial: History betrayed. Carlton, Victoria:
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White, H. (1973). Metahistory. Baltimore: John Hopkins
University Press.
Wilson, S. M., Shulman, L. S., & Richert, A. E. (1987). "150
different ways" of knowing: Representations of knowledge in
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(pp. 104-124). London: Cassell.