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#21
Off the Record / Re: TV/Movies Megathread
Last post by celedhring - Today at 11:49:08 AMSo, I took my mom to watch the Maria Callas movie, which is a very mom movie. It chronicles the last week of the life of Maria Callas, played by Angelina Jolie. She wanders through Paris with her brain drenched in opioids, talking to characters real and imaginary while she reflects on her life.
Like the other movies in the trilogy that preceded it (Jackie and Spencer) the film looks gorgeous, but it really fails at portraying anything particularly insightful of its main character either as a person or as an icon. Jolie delivers an actually pretty good performance (might be one of her best, tbf), but she is saddled with pretentious dialogue throughout. The best part of the film was the relationship with her servants, which is the only time the script allows her to be more human.
In some weird way the movie feels a lot like an Euro 1970s new wave movie - with all the the lampshading of narrative artifice, collage techniques and the dreamlike approach of mixing fantasy and reality. I don't know if that's intended as part of the recreation
- but I give it props for trying a different approach to the biopic. That and the fact that Jolie is really good in it made the movie watchable.
Like the other movies in the trilogy that preceded it (Jackie and Spencer) the film looks gorgeous, but it really fails at portraying anything particularly insightful of its main character either as a person or as an icon. Jolie delivers an actually pretty good performance (might be one of her best, tbf), but she is saddled with pretentious dialogue throughout. The best part of the film was the relationship with her servants, which is the only time the script allows her to be more human.
In some weird way the movie feels a lot like an Euro 1970s new wave movie - with all the the lampshading of narrative artifice, collage techniques and the dreamlike approach of mixing fantasy and reality. I don't know if that's intended as part of the recreation
- but I give it props for trying a different approach to the biopic. That and the fact that Jolie is really good in it made the movie watchable. #22
Off the Record / Re: What does a TRUMP presiden...
Last post by Valmy - Today at 11:33:55 AMYeah. Elon could cut everything to the bone and the deficit and debt will still skyrocket.
And then blame "out of control spending" for it. Claim that economic growth will cover the deficit and then preside over an economic collapse. Let's do it again.
Quote from: viper37 on Today at 09:55:07 AMJust because it didn't work the last 3 times doesn't mean it won't work this time.
And then blame "out of control spending" for it. Claim that economic growth will cover the deficit and then preside over an economic collapse. Let's do it again.
#23
Off the Record / Re: The 1619 Project
Last post by Oexmelin - Today at 11:33:01 AMYes, on all three. The devil is very much in the details - about how to achieve that balancing act, which is harder and harder as the politics of history become more and more rigid and intolerant.
#24
Off the Record / Re: Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-2...
Last post by Syt - Today at 11:31:23 AM
#25
Off the Record / Re: The 1619 Project
Last post by Jacob - Today at 11:27:13 AMA few semi-related thoughts:
Critiquing skills may be applicable if there's a narrative to critique.
Teaching a narrative just to immediately tear into it with critiquing skills could very easily come across as attacking and or disingenuous.
Also, IMO, peoples and societies need common narratives to function
Critiquing skills may be applicable if there's a narrative to critique.
Teaching a narrative just to immediately tear into it with critiquing skills could very easily come across as attacking and or disingenuous.
Also, IMO, peoples and societies need common narratives to function
#26
Off the Record / Re: Brexit and the waning days...
Last post by crazy canuck - Today at 11:22:25 AMThere was a boom of economic mobility for Black men in the 60s.
Your charts are not measuring economic mobility.
Your charts are not measuring economic mobility.
#27
Off the Record / Re: The 1619 Project
Last post by Oexmelin - Today at 11:03:44 AMThe model you describe, Sheilbh, is the sort of model many historians have suggested over the years - basically something about "developping critical thinking skills".
I think it is laudable. It was mostly developped as an answer to strong mythical/national history narratives, and it has largely developped out of the rise of social history.
However, in the recent years, I think we have seen that it also runs the risk of leaving aside some basic building blocks of institutional history - esp., i.e., trying to understand how our societies "work". I remember David Hall, the great historian of the Puritans, having this sort of epiphany in a conference, that our critical narratives were continuously revising a baseline that was less and less understood.
It can also tend to leave unattended another purpose of history-as-civics, which is to provide the context for some shared cultural landmarks. At some point, for instance, you kinda have to learn some elements of, say, Catholicism, to make sense of the Reformation and its impact on British history.
The challenge, therefore, are to provide both a moment for history-as-narrative, and a moment for history-as-critique. In North America, at least, the old consensus was to (mostly) keep history-as-narrative for primary and secondary education, and leave history-as-critique for college. That broke down somewhat. I couldn't assume my American students had a firm grasp on the events of colonial America - even as they knew the beats of revisionist history, while the many of the more passionate history students had to turn to popular history (the bloody Presidents...) to provide them with more complex (but oh so problematic) narratives.
Of course, history-as-critique was always subjected to criticism, either because what was taught didn't fit well the old narrative model ("they don't know the names of our Prime Ministers!") or because it directly attacked the more mythical parts of national history (which is what Trumpians are targetting now, with their version of official, authorized history).
I think it is laudable. It was mostly developped as an answer to strong mythical/national history narratives, and it has largely developped out of the rise of social history.
However, in the recent years, I think we have seen that it also runs the risk of leaving aside some basic building blocks of institutional history - esp., i.e., trying to understand how our societies "work". I remember David Hall, the great historian of the Puritans, having this sort of epiphany in a conference, that our critical narratives were continuously revising a baseline that was less and less understood.
It can also tend to leave unattended another purpose of history-as-civics, which is to provide the context for some shared cultural landmarks. At some point, for instance, you kinda have to learn some elements of, say, Catholicism, to make sense of the Reformation and its impact on British history.
The challenge, therefore, are to provide both a moment for history-as-narrative, and a moment for history-as-critique. In North America, at least, the old consensus was to (mostly) keep history-as-narrative for primary and secondary education, and leave history-as-critique for college. That broke down somewhat. I couldn't assume my American students had a firm grasp on the events of colonial America - even as they knew the beats of revisionist history, while the many of the more passionate history students had to turn to popular history (the bloody Presidents...) to provide them with more complex (but oh so problematic) narratives.
Of course, history-as-critique was always subjected to criticism, either because what was taught didn't fit well the old narrative model ("they don't know the names of our Prime Ministers!") or because it directly attacked the more mythical parts of national history (which is what Trumpians are targetting now, with their version of official, authorized history).
#28
Off the Record / Re: The 1619 Project
Last post by garbon - Today at 10:57:41 AMQuote from: viper37 on Today at 09:50:55 AMQuote from: garbon on Today at 06:10:20 AMAlso interesting was the portrayal of Lincoln. I was definitely never taught that Frederick Douglass had this to say - where he can complicate our mythologizing of Abraham Lincoln and yet still celebrate him and his accomplishments.All of this about Abraham Lincoln can be explained once you get out of the myth that the Civil War was fought over slavery, from the North's point of view. The South fought slavery on which depended their economy and future, the North fought to protect the Union, on which depended their economy and future.
Lincoln engaged in a war to protect the Union. Everything he did, even abolishing slavery in the end was to protect the Union, in his mind.
Lincoln still believed, before his election, that the Black man was inferior to the White man. He was but a product of his time.
He said so himself at the beginning of the war that if he could end the war by freeing no slaves, freeing some or freeing them all he would do it.
It is no surprise that Douglass would celebrate his accomplishment, while criticizing the man.
Oh it completely makes sense it is just that it is completely swept under the rug.
In fact, one thing that was pointed out in 1619 was how the initial draft of the Emancipation Proclamation spoke of compensation for those losing property as well that black people should be encouraged to go back and colonize Africa. While I know we were taught about Liberia and incidentally the American Colonization Society, I recall that presented as solely a pre-war thing and not something advocated by the great Lincoln.
#29
Off the Record / Re: The 1619 Project
Last post by garbon - Today at 10:51:48 AMQuote from: Sheilbh on Today at 10:26:21 AMQuote from: garbon on Today at 08:59:38 AMI definitely would have found repeated years of American history more interesting in school if they could have provided us a more complex picture.At what sort of level and how was it taught?
I don't remember having a "British history" class or learning it chronologically at school here. I was in Scotland and remember a whistlestop tour of Picts, Mary, Queen of Scots, Jacobites, Highland Clearances etc but it was very jumping through time - and basically until 14 (when it becomes optional). Obviously there is an angle in that narrative ().
But for 14-18 it's modular rather than chronological - and the whole point was really about making arguments. That speech I think would have been loved in a course (I didn't do the American Civil War at school) because my memory was that it was all about learning about different sources, thinking about how to balance them (who's writing, when, for what purpose etc) and basically building an argument using sources. So I think two of the most popular modules (I did both at my school) are the origins of the First World War and the rise of the Nazis - in part because there's loads of good primary and secondary sources and there's a live historiographical argument that essay questions will be based on. Is it a similar approach in the US? Because I feel like that speech would be really helpful in that sort of class?
So things are hazy at this point, but I feel like until UK equivalent of Year 6 - we mostly did state focused history (so Oregon Trail, Gold Rush, Donner Party, the cozy side of the Mission system in California and Pilgrims, Revolutionary War in MA) over and over again. There was also light dusting of broader American history as I can remember worksheets about Washington/Jefferson/Lincoln and MLK Jr (which I think was always part of Black History month/his recognised birthday) in elementary school.
Then we started expanding more into broader American history and World history but never more modern than WWII. As I mentioned to Oex, by year 12 I was in a class that engaged with more complicated history (plus combined with literature) where there would have been room to look at that Douglass speech.
#30
Off the Record / Re: Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-2...
Last post by Legbiter - Today at 10:47:28 AMI doubt even the Germans want to put their balls into the russian vice twice.