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Tackling Seminal U.S. Documents How English and History teachers can benefit from
collaborative teaching of historical documents
The presenters
Geoff Belcher ◦ 21 years at Wake Forest High
◦ Teaches AP and Regular senior
English and advises the
newspaper
Marlin Jones ◦ 15 years in WCPSS
◦ Currently at Panther Creek High
◦ Teaches US History, Honors US
History, and AP US History
The Kenan Fellows Experience
As 2012 NCSU Kenan Fellows, we were
tasked with helping English and History
teachers to develop reading strategies for
historical documents.
Working with Julie Joslin at DPI, we
developed five different units that mesh
historical documents with traditional
English classroom novels
Analyze seminal U.S. documents of
historical and literary significance (e.g.,
Washington’s Farewell Address, the
Gettysburg Address, Roosevelt’s Four
Freedoms speech, King’s “Letter from
Birmingham Jail”), including how they
address related themes and concepts.
Nervous?
English teachers have natural trepidation
over how to incorporate such texts into
the English classroom.
History teachers wonder how they can
teach students how to read and analyze
the texts beyond the recall of basic
information.
Help from History
History teachers, familiar with the
documents, provide context, audience and
purpose analysis to English teachers
unfamiliar with these letters or speeches
Initial collaborative conversations help
English teachers to meld documents with
the themes of their literature units
APPARTS
Author
Place and time
Prior knowledge activation
Audience
Reason (Why created when it was)
The main idea
Significance (Why was the text important)
Enlightenment from English
English teachers help History colleagues
to guide their students through an
analysis of how the text was created and
how the rhetorical devices characterize
the author and create tone and purpose.
Device based questions…
Why the specific diction chosen?
Why those similes or metaphors?
Why passive voice then active voice?
Why a shift in sentence type or length?
Why that particular imagery (sense language)?
Why that allusion?
Why those rhetorical appeals (ethos, logos, pathos)?
The Context
The U. S. in the
1960s
◦ Inquiry based
learning activity
Selected photos
I noticed/I wonder
chart
◦ Clips from Eye on
the Prize
The context
“I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of
all communities and states. I cannot sit
idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned
about what happens in Birmingham.
Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice
everywhere.”
— King
The context
“I had hoped that the white moderate
would understand that law and order
exist for the purpose of establishing
justice and that when they fail in this
purpose they become the dangerously
structured dams that block the flow of
social progress.”
— King
The connection
How is Alabama in 1963 similar to and
different than the Alabama of the 1930s
depicted in Lee’s novel?
How are King and Atticus’ approach to
combatting racial tensions similar?
The Standards
RI 5: Analyze in detail how an author’s ideas
or claims are developed and refined by
particular sentences, paragraphs, or larger
portions of a text (e.g., a section or chapter).
RI 6: Determine an author’s point of view or
purpose in a text and analyze how an author
uses rhetoric to advance that point of view or
purpose.
The analysis
Pathos: Where does King make an appeal to the reader’s emotions?
“…when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky…”
The analysis
Ethical Appeal: Writers using ethos may offer a definition for an obscure term or detailed statistics to establish their authority and knowledge.
“Just as the prophets of the eighth century B.C. left their villages and carried their "thus saith the Lord" far beyond the boundaries of their home towns: and just as the Apostle Paul left his village of Tarsus and carried the gospel of Jesus Christ to the far corners of the Greco-Roman…”
The analysis
Logical Appeal: The logical appeal uses
reason to make its case. The logical appeal
often cites statistics, scientific evidence, or
published reports to lead the reader to
accept the author’s viewpoint
The analysis
“…There can be no gainsaying the fact
that racial injustice engulfs this
community. Birmingham is probably the
most thoroughly segregated city in the
United States. Its ugly record of brutality
is widely known.”
Enrichment
Comparison of King’s speech to Malcolm
X’s “Message to the Grassroots.”
Video clip: King and Malcolm speak for
themselves
◦ http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/eyesonthepriz
e/resources/vid/11_video_noi_qt.html
The Units
Contrasting
President Wilson’s
attitude towards
taking America to
war with the
attitudes
expressed by
characters in the
novel
Wilson’s World War I Speech
The Context
◦ WWI and Unrestricted
Submarine Warfare
◦ Neutrality of the US
Rhetorical Analysis
The Standards
RI 5: Analyze in detail how an author’s ideas
or claims are developed and refined by
particular sentences, paragraphs, or larger
portions of a text (e.g., a section or chapter).
RI 6: Determine an author’s point of view or
purpose in a text and analyze how an author
uses rhetoric to advance that point of view or
purpose.
The Context
“I am not now thinking of the loss of property involved, immense and serious as that is, but only of the wanton and wholesale destruction of the lives of non-combatants, men, women, and children, engaged in pursuits which have always, even in the darkest periods of modern history, been deemed innocent and legitimate. Property can be paid for; the lives of peaceful and innocent people cannot be. The present German submarine warfare against commerce is a warfare against mankind.” —Wilson
The Context
“We have no quarrel with the German
people. We have no feeling towards them
but one of sympathy and friendship. It was
not upon their impulse that their
government acted in entering this war. It
was not with their previous knowledge or
approval.”
The Connection
Wilson’s speech contrasts sharply with
the rhetoric of Kantorek, the teacher of
the boys in the novel. Kantorek
represents a blind nationalism and
glorification of war. Wilson, on the other
hand, offers a more sober assessment of
the dangers of war
The analysis
Diction
“The choice we make for ourselves must be made
with a moderation of counsel and a
temperateness of judgment befitting our
character and our motives as a nation.”
Pathos
Hyperbole
Passive voice
Sudden shift to active voice
The Units
Exploring how the pivotal scene where
Nora leaves her husband in Ibsen’s A
Doll’s House reflects the key ideas of the
women’s rights movement expressed in
Stanton’s “Declaration of Sentiments”
The Context
The context
◦ 19th Century U.S.
Cult of Domesticity
Age of Reform Women’s Rights
Temperance
Abolition
Comparison with the Declaration of Independence
◦ http://www.library.csi.cuny.edu/dept/history/lavender/2decs.html
The Connection
Students are given eight statements from Stanton’s piece and are asked to find statements by Nora in the closing act that express similar concerns about the roles of women
◦ The history of mankind is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations on the part of man toward woman, having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over her.
Nora says…
“I mean that I was simply transferred from papa's hands into yours. You arranged everything according to your own taste, and so I got the same tastes as your else I pretended to, I am really not quite sure which--I think sometimes the one and sometimes the other. When I look back on it, it seems to me as if I had been living here like a poor woman--just from hand to mouth. I have existed merely to perform tricks for you, Torvald. But you would have it so. You and papa have committed a great sin against me. It is your fault that I have made nothing of my life.”
Enrichment
Students can also read Hillary Rodham
Clinton’s speech “Women’s Rights are
Human Rights”
Students assess which concerns poised by
Stanton and Ibsen are still relevant on a
world stage today as women globally face
many of the same struggles as Stanton
and Nora
The Units
President Washington’s Farewell Address
provides a challenging stand-alone unit for
11th grade students
Washington’s Farewell Address Introductory Activity
Prompt #1
What does it mean to you to be called an American? Discuss several thoughts, emotions, or ideas. You may first list several things to get started, but your response should be in several complete sentences.
Prompt #2
America is comprised of many regional areas that have their own identities. Work with your study groups to make a list of some of these various regions of the country.
Now that you have your list, choose the region that applies to you—either because you live there now or because you grew up in that region and moved but still identify yourself with the area. Write about what being called by that region means to you. (e.g. What does it mean to be called a Southerner? A New Yorker? A Yankee? A Mid-westerner? etc.)
Prompt #3
Upon which name or identity do you place the most importance being an American or the identifier of your region? Explain.
Washington’s Farewell Cont…
Guided Practice
In one sentence Washington seems to offer you an answer about which he thought was more important: being called an American or being name by one’s region. In which paragraph does he offer his answer?
Sometimes paraphrasing or restating difficult sentences into your own words can be a helpful strategy. Work with your peers to paraphrase the first sentence of paragraph 9. Put your paraphrase below:
Some of the Rhetorical Analysis
One ancient rhetorical form is the apologia. Apologia is a specific genre in which an orator defends himself or his actions against accusation.
What accusation does Washington defend himself against, in advance of it being made, in the opening paragraphs of the address?
What specific quote best illustrates the apologia?
By making this apology in advance, what does Washington preclude the congress from doing had it decided to do so?
Rhetorical analysis cont. In an essay analyzing Washington’s rhetoric (see footnote below), Halford Ryan
writes, “The ability to coin a metaphor has always been prized in oratory, for metaphors invite audiences to perceive new relationships and to attribute to the speaker a sharp intellect (9).
In paragraph 25 what does Washington liken political parties to?
Why is the metaphor a particularly apt one given the type of discourse or language usually employed by partisan political parties?
Pathos is another rhetorical device in which the orator appeals to and plays upon the emotions of his audience. By what metaphor in paragraph 32 does Washington make an emotional appeal? (Quote the text)
Why would this appeal have been immediately understandable to the white audience of Washington’s address?
Where in his famous speech does Patrick Henry, writing 18 years earlier, first utilize the same metaphor? (Quote the text and paragraph)
Looking at both metaphors, whose is more effective and why? (In your analysis consider elements such as diction and syntax)
The Four Freedoms
Freedom of speech and expression
Freedom of worship
Freedom from want
Freedom from fear
Common Dystopian Conventions
Human abuse of technology
Technology outpaces humanity’s spiritual evolution
A police state (strict governmental control)
Individualism is discouraged / Collectivism is encouraged
Citizens may not have names
A rigid caste system exists
Concepts and symbols of religion are replaced or eliminated
Appreciation of nature is discouraged
Enrichment
How are the principles of Roosevelt’s speech violated in the dystopian society depicted in The Hunger Games?