Last year a friend and I collaborated to teach an Osher course called Historians Talk About History. She recently retired from a 30-year career as a college history professor; I retired from teaching history at the high school level and have pursued genealogy and broader history research in retirement. The course focused on what history is (and isn’t), what historians do (and don’t do), and what the purpose of history education is in a democratic society. We put this course together because we agreed that there were a lot of misconceptions out there about these topics, and we wanted to share some of our insights with Osher members (who are a very well-educated and outspoken group of individuals who don’t suffer fools gladly). The course was well-received, generating extensive waitlists both semesters we taught it.
Yes, very good summation of where we are and where we are heading.
In retrospect probably from a more distant future then we can now achieve, suspect this MAGAGA madness will look more like an archetypical wave from the collective unconscious than a current trend that yields to logical understanding.
Potential examples could be the European dark ages after the collapse of Rome or the Greek dark ages after the Bronze Age collapse.
Yes, very good summation of where we are and where we are heading.
In retrospect probably from a more distant future then we can now achieve, suspect this MAGAGA madness will look more like an archetypical wave from the collective unconscious than a current trend that yields to logical understanding.
Potential examples could be the European dark ages after the collapse of Rome or the Greek dark ages after the Bronze Age collapse.
Hopefully this one won’t last as long
Great piece.
Sounds like a good course for Chautauqua...