21H.390 | Fall 2022 | Undergraduate, Graduate

Theories and Methods in the Study of History

Pages

Response Papers

The success of this class depends on the active participation of all students. You must do all the required readings and come to class ready to actively contribute to class discussions by carefully listening to and engaging with your colleagues. To help you prepare for class discussion, I will require you to write a brief response paper each week of about 500 words.

Class participation and response papers will be 45% of your total grade.   

Universities and Slavery Essay

Please pick one of the universities listed in the Universities & Slavery section on the MIT and Slavery site, and write an essay (750 words) about its involvement in slavery. You MUST read the excerpts below from Wilder’s book before you write the essay.

Craig Steven Wilder, “Prologue” and “Epilogue,” in Ebony and Ivy: Race, Slavery, and the Troubled History of America’s Universities, pp. 1–11 and pp. 275–88, Bloomsbury Publishing, 2014. ISBN: ‎9781608194025. [Preview with Google Books]

Please browse this article: Mike Featherstone, “Archive.” Theory, Culture & Society 23, no. 2–3 (2006): 591–96.  

The essay will be due during week 2.

Final Paper

You will write a 15-20 (undergraduates) and 25 (graduate students) page paper based on substantial research in primary sources. You must write clearly, beautifully, and persuasively.

Various preparatory writing exercises through the semester will help students develop a topic, a bibliography, and an argument in advance of the final paper itself. Students will also be required to make oral presentations of their research.

Paper topics, bibliography, and preliminary research for the final paper are due during week 5.

The oral presentations will occur during weeks 12 and 13.

The final paper is due during week 14.

The final paper will be 30% of your total grade. The oral presentation will be 15% of your total grade.

Student Examples

“Charles Blackman and the Activation of Lynching in Schley County, Georgia.” (PDF)

“From Slaves to Hillbillies: A Racial History of the Banjo in the 18th and 19th Centuries.” (PDF)

Note: All student examples appear courtesy of MIT students. Unless otherwise requested, examples appear anonymously.

I. Introduction

Week 1: Introduction: How Do Historians Think?

Assignment due: Response paper

Week 2: Writing from an Archive: Race, Slavery, and American Universities

Assignment due: University and Slavery essay (see Assignments section)

II. Historical Analysis and Interpretation

Week 3: What is a Good Question? Historiographical and Empirical Contexts

Assignment due: Response paper

Week 4: How Do Historians Use Theory?

Assignment due: Response paper

Week 5: NO CLASS

Assignments due: 

III. Sources Used by Historians

Week 6: Writing from a Diary: Midwife’s Tale in Maine, 1785–1812

Assignment due: Response paper

Week 7: Writing from Environment

Assignment due: Response paper

Week 8: Doing Conceptual History: Japan

Assignment due: Response paper

Week 9: Writing from Oral Sources: Nairobi, Kenya

Assignment due: Response paper

Week 10: History, Commemoration, and Truth and Reconciliation

Assignment due: Response paper

Week 11: NO CLASS: Thanksgiving

Weeks 12 and 13: Research Presentations

Week 14: Research Papers Due

Instructor Interview

Below, Prof. Kenda Mutongi describes various aspects of how she taught 21H.390 Theories and Methods in the Study of History in fall 2022.

OCW: What is it like teaching a mixed undergraduate-graduate course? Were there any differences in your expectations for graduate students and undergraduates, other than the fact that the graduate students’ final papers should be longer?

Kenda Mutongi: Teaching graduate and undergraduates together was challenging sometimes. There were two very shy undergraduates, and I think they struggled a bit at the beginning. But by gently nudging them to speak up, I was able to help them participate regularly. All the graduate students were marvelous. Those who knew a lot about the topics we were discussing often talked a lot, but in a way that was constructive to everyone; they were not showy at all. We had amazing discussions; there was never a dull moment.

OCW: You explicitly specify in the syllabus that students should write “clearly, beautifully, and persuasively.” What are your thoughts on the importance of beauty in academic writing?

Kenda Mutongi: I believe beautiful, clear language can convey difficult concepts and ideas much more effectively than jargony language. I also believe that writing clearly is a sign that students really understand what they are talking about.

OCW: You asked each student to lead one discussion section by crafting questions for class discussion. How did that work? Did you often have to tweak the students’ questions to stimulate adequate discussion or to guide the discussion in a more fruitful direction?

Kenda Mutongi: Yes. But just a bit. I asked students to avoid questions that can be answered with a “yes” or a “no.” I also urged them not to formulate questions that are highly factual. Instead they should use questions that start with “how”; questions that solicit comparisons, reflections. Students were often good at coming up with good questions. Since the questions were posted 24 hours before our class meetings, everybody had the chance to read them before we met. I paired graduate and undergraduate students, and I felt that undergraduates learnt from the graduate students and the graduate students listened to what the undergraduates had to say. I think this worked out very well.

OCW: This was your third time teaching the course since 2020. How did the course evolve from one iteration to another? Did you make changes either in the general approach or in specific policies, expectations, or assignments?

Kenda Mutongi: Yes. I made a few changes. The first time I taught the course, it was mainly graduate students and we focused largely on historiographical arguments. The last two times the course had lots of undergraduates and I made it more comprehensive; we focused on all the “tools of trade,” such as what a good question is, how to do interviews, what to look for in the archives, how to use theory, how to write clearly, etc.

Assessment

Grade Breakdown

The students’ grades were based on the following activities:

  • 45% Class participation and response papers 
  • 10% Student-led discussions
  • 30% Final paper
  • 15% Oral presentations

Curriculum Information

Prerequisites

None

Requirements Satisfied

Offered

Every fall semester

Student Information

Enrollment

18 students

Breakdown by Year

About two-thirds graduate students, one-third undergraduates

Breakdown by Major

Most students were pursuing degrees or concentrations in history or in the HASTS program; the remainder were studying architecture or urban studies and planning.

How Student Time Was Spent

During an average week, students were expected to spend 12 hours on the course, roughly divided as follows:

In Class

Met 1 time per week for 3 hours per session; 13 sessions total; mandatory attendance.

Out of Class

Outside of class, students completed assigned readings, wrote assigned papers, and prepared for presentations.

I. Introduction

Week 1: Introduction: How Do Historians Think?

View:

Read:

Week 2: Writing from an Archive: Race, Slavery, and American Universities

  • Craig Steven Wilder, “Prologue” and “Epilogue,” in Ebony and Ivy: Race, Slavery, and the Troubled History of America’s Universities, pp. 1–11 and pp. 275–88 (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2014). ISBN: ‎9781608194025. [Preview with Google Books]
  • Mike Featherstone, “Archive.” Theory, Culture & Society 23, no. 2–3 (2006): 591–96.  

II. Historical Analysis and Interpretation

Week 3: What Is a Good Question? Historiographical and Empirical Contexts

  • John Lewis Gaddis, The Landscape of History: How Historians Map the Past, pp. 53–109 (Oxford University Press, 2004). ISBN: ‎9780195171570. [Preview with Google Books]

Was Abraham Lincoln gay?

  • David Herbert Donald, We Are Lincoln Men: Abraham Lincoln and His Friends, pp. 29–64 (Simon & Schuster, 2003). ISBN: ‎9780743254687. [Preview with Google Books]
  • C.A. Tripp, The Intimate World of Abraham Lincoln, pp. 1–21 (Free Press, 2005). ISBN: 9780743266390. [Preview with Google Books]
  • Christopher Capozzola, “The Gay Lincoln Controversy,” Boston Globe, January 16, 2005.  

Why did Truman drop the bomb?

  • Michael Sherry, “The Slide to Total Air War,” New Republic, December 16, 1981.
  • Henry L. Stimson, “The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb,” Harper’s Magazine 194, no. 1161 (1947): 97–107.

Why is Haiti poor?

Week 4: How Do Historians Use Theory?

  • Shalene Sayegh and Eric Altice, “The Importance of Theory in History,” in History and Theory (Pearson, 2013). ISBN: ‎9780136157250. 
  • Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish, esp. Part I, ch. 1, (pp. 1–31); Part III entire (pp. 135–228) (Vintage Books, 1995). ISBN: 9780679752554. [Preview with Google Books]
  • Patricia O’Brien, “Michel Foucault’s History of Culture,” in The New Cultural History (University of California Press, 1989). ISBN: ‎9780520064294. [Preview with Google Books]
  • Regina Kunzel, “Queer History, Mad History, and the Politics of Health.” American Quarterly 69, no. 2 (2017): 315–19.
  • M.J. Fuentes, “Power and Historical Figuring: Rachael Pringle Polgreen’s Troubled Archive.” Gender & History 22, no. 3 (2010): 564–84.

Week 5: NO CLASS

  • No readings assigned.

III. Sources Used by Historians

Week 6: Writing from a Diary: Midwife’s Tale in Maine, 1785–1812

View:

Read:

  • Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, A Midwife’s Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard, Based on Her Diary, 1785–1812, pp. 1–35, 162–65, 346–52 (Vintage, 1991). ISBN: ‎9780679733768. [Preview with Google Books]
  • Alexandra Garbarini, Numbered Days: Diaries and the Holocaust, pp. ix–xiii, 22–57, 129–61, 162–67. (Yale University Press, 2006). ISBN: 9780300112528. [Preview with Google Books]

Week 7: Writing from Environment

Week 8: Doing Conceptual History: Japan

  • Eiko Maruko Siniawer, Waste: Consuming Postwar Japan (Cornell University Press, 2018). ISBN: ‎9781501725845. [Preview with Google Books

Week 9: Writing from Oral Sources: Nairobi, Kenya

Week 10: History, Commemoration, and Truth and Reconciliation

Weeks 11–14

  • No readings assigned.

Course Meeting Times

Lectures: 1 session / week; 3 hours / session

Prerequisites

Two History subjects or permission of the instructor.

Course Overview

This class has two aims: to introduce students to methods and approaches commonly used in the scholarly study of history, and to give students the opportunity to develop a major historical essay based on primary sources. Historians do a lot of things in a lot of different ways, and so will we. We will study an array of topics across time and space as well as the distinctive ways in which historians of different parts of the world have approached the task of writing history. We will explore a number of different methodologies, such as political, social, economic, cultural, and popular histories. We will also consider a variety of sources (archival documents, oral sources, film, fiction, diaries, objects, and images) and the ways they can be used to research, interpret, and present the past.

Required Books

Kenda Mutongi, Matatu: A History of Popular Transportation in Nairobi (University of Chicago Press, 2017). ISBN: ‎9780226471396. 

Eiko Maruko Siniawer, Waste: Consuming Postwar Japan (Cornell University Press, 2018). ISBN: ‎9781501725845. [Preview with Google Books

For additional readings, see the Readings section.

Grading Policy

ACTIVITIES PERCENTAGES
Class participation and response papers  45%
Student-led discussions 10%
Final paper 30%
Oral presentations  15%

For detail on the activities above, see the Assignments section.

Course Info

Instructor
Departments
As Taught In
Fall 2022
Learning Resource Types
Written Assignments with Examples
Readings
Instructor Insights