American Social History

Worcester State is closed today (Friday, 1/21/11) because of the snowstorm. Therefore we won’t be having an in-class discussion about Gutman’s essay on the working class during American industrialization. We’ll discuss that essay briefly in class on Monday, but I don’t want to get too far behind in the syllabus, so we won’t spend the whole class on it.

Instead of our class meeting today, I have designed a worksheet that can be completed at home and uploaded to Digital Dropbox. Click here to download it. Instructions for how to complete and send it back are in the document.

If I receive one back from you, I’ll count you as having attended today even though we are officially closed (i.e. bonus). This assignment is not required, because the university is closed and not everyone may have access to a functional internet connection. However, I do recommend doing it, because it will get you used to the kinds of discussion questions I am likely to ask and the depth to which I want you to delve into our readings. Note that I am looking not only for your understanding of the essay’s CONTENT but also its scholarly APPROACH: evidence, argument, and Gutman’s writerly decisions.

For Monday, here is the list of topics that I’d like you to be familiar with:

• The Lochner v. New York case (1905) – (perhaps begin here at a UMKC Law School site)
• The Muller v. Oregon case (1908) – (a very short overview is here, to get you started. Text of the case can be found at Oyez.org or here at the Cornell Law site)
• The Triangle Shirtwaist Fire (there’s an outstanding website on it here designed by Cornell U)
• the concept of “liberty of contract” as it pertains to the 14th Amendment (see the Lochner link, above; also here’s a teacher lesson plan that covers this concept)
• The “Bread and Roses” strike in Lawrence in 1912 (begin at Mass Moments, then read this article by left labor historian Joyce Kornbluh. You might also be interested in how the city of Lawrence memorializes the event)

For those of you with the Zinn book, he discusses some of these topics in Chapter 13.

I need to make a slight change to the presentation days; I will be out of town on Friday, Feb 4th so we won’t have class that day, so no presentations that week. That means some of you really will need to present next Friday so that we have time for everyone in the class to have a chance (~5 students per presentation day).

I probably should explain a little more about what it means to “present” in any given week. It means that you do a little extra research into one of the Monday topics (or a topic related to them), write a 2-3 page response paper, and design a 5 or 6-minute “something” for Friday’s class. It does not have to be a PowerPoint presentation (and in fact, I really discourage the use of those unless you can make your presentation dynamic and not just a recitation of what’s written on the slides). Consider: a game, an activity, a talk (not a “reading” of your paper), a Pecha Kucha, a concept map, a short focused discussion that involves the class, a podcast “radio program,” a video made by you, or a demonstration.

Possible presentation days are: 1/28 (and since everyone has a response paper due that day, you’d have to either write 2, or turn in one on some other presentation day), 2/11, 3/4, 3/11, 3/25, 4/8, 4/15, 4/29. Email me your preference or sign up on Monday.

What it’s not …

Instead…

“[Social history's] fundamental twin premises–that ordinary people not only have a history but contribute to shaping history more generally, and that a range of behaviors can be profitably explored beyond… the most familiar political staples.” — Peter N. Stearns, “Social History Present and Future” (JSH, 2003)

No one methodology; rather, “a fundamental reorientation of many of the traditional concerns of the discipline” loosely congregating around three methodologies: statistical analysis (“cliometrics”), social theory (drawing on anthropology, sociology, demography, labor economics), and Progressivism (“telling the American story from the bottom up”). “The great strength of this approach–a phenomenological perspective that depicts the historical experience ‘as it was actually lived’ by men and women in the past.” — James A. Henretta, “Social History as Lived and Written” (AHR, 1979).

We will meet two practitioners of the field in our early readings: Howard Zinn, and Herb Gutman.

Howard Zinn passed away in 2010, a much-lauded figure on the American left, a popular and controversial professor at Boston University, and the author of a bestselling revisionist US history, A People’s History of the United States. I’ve assigned his book as a second text for the Honors students (and indeed, anyone is welcome to it, I recommend owning a copy) because I think it deserves careful and critical reading as it provides a strong counterpoint to mainstream historical texts. It’s uneven, sometimes angry, sloppy in its documentation and often one-sided in its portrayals… but still, worth your time to read and consider. He wasn’t a “social historian” per se, but his approach is undeniably in line with social history – to tell the American story with an emphasis on dissent and resistance, class conflict, the masses, and giving voice to marginalized people and groups to restore them to our collective sense of a “usable” past. Use Zinn as little or as much as you like this term – get to know his style and what themes, people and events he chooses to emphasize (and which stories he chooses to overlook, ignore, or suppress).

In 2009, Zinn re-entered popular culture with a A&E film, “The People Speak,” featuring actors reading the words of some of the historical figures who appear in Zinn’s books – here’s the trailer.
The People Speak – Howard Zinn

photography | .

The second practitioner is Herbert Gutman; we’re reading an excerpt from his essay, “Work, Culture and Society in Industrializing America 1815-1919.” I’ve posted it in 2 parts (Part 1, Part 2). Gutman was a labor historian, author of The Black Family in Slavery and Freedom, and a professor at the City University of New York who helped found the American Social History Project and “Who Built America?” which was an innovative attempt to reinvent the American survey textbook, both in content and in form (as a multimedia CD-ROM).

As you read Gutman’s essay, consider these questions:

• Where is he looking for evidence, and what are his findings?
• What do we learn about industrializing America from 1815-1919?
• Why those dates?
• What does it mean to “industrialize”?
• Is Gutman more focused here on people, or on historical processes?
• What does that tell us about his scholarly approach or methods?

I handed out some advice on how to read a scholarly article – here’s the PDF in case you need it again.

In this unit we have explored how immigrants figure prominently in the “founding narrative” of our nation as colonizers, settlers, conquerors, and heroes of freedom. Late 19th-century immigrants, too, especially those from Europe, also people history heroically as seekers of financial betterment and religious freedom (e.g. the “Great American Melting Pot” Schoolhouse Rock video we saw). We have discussed how immigrants’ own accounts (the “Undistinguished Americans”) often didn’t fit the idealized vision of immigrants depicted in the Statue of Liberty’s poem. And contemporary immigrants spark ongoing controversy in America today over resources, border control, and who does or doesn’t “fit” in a pluralist American society. Many of these issues are particularly contentious in schools, which are the front line of educating young newcomers, and where questions of language, history, and identity are especially fraught.

In this assignment, you’ll put yourself in the place of an educator looking to broaden his/her curriculum to be more inclusive of “undistinguished” immigrant Americans. You, the educator, have selected or have been given Pam Munoz Ryan’s novel Esperanza Rising, and must now build a lesson or a series of lessons around it.

First, decide what grade you teach. Is this a late elementary school classroom (4th or 5th grade?)? If so, you might use the novel across both Language Arts and Social Studies. Is this a middle school classroom (6th, 7th or 8th grade)? If so, it is part of a Social Studies and/or Geography curriculum. Is this a high school classroom (9th-12th grade)? The novel may be part of a US History or general Social Studies class.

Next, develop a lesson plan that will realistically fill at least one class session. You’ll need to consider the learning capabilities of the students in your classroom, and will need to engage their interest and find a creative or compelling way to incorporate the novel in your teaching.

Consider these questions in your planning:
What will you want students to learn from this novel?
What goals will your lesson or project accomplish?
How long will it take?
Will they work in groups or individually?
How will you measure your students’ learning?
What other resources or materials might be needed?
What educational standards are addressed? (E.g. You could use the Massachusetts or National History Frameworks, or the actual standards of a school district of your choice)

On Wed 4/29, you’ll turn in a packet containing:

• 1) One lesson plan “grid,” completed (here is a PDF of the form; a type-into Word version is here)
• 2) A “script” or set of instructions so that the lesson(s) can be used over again or shared with other teachers (see the list of examples below for ideas on what that might look like)
• 3) A short (1-page) reflection paper (similar to what you did for the Digital Project) explaining what you learned from this assignment

Your project will be assessed for completeness of those 3 items, creativity of the lesson or project, suitability & appropriateness for the age group in your classroom, whether the project is realistic and do-able, and whether it incorporates the novel successfully.

Here are some examples of lesson plans and ideas from a variety of educator websites that incorporate social history topics using children’s literature or primary sources, to give you some inspiration:

• A sample 10th-grade lesson plan using a film to discuss the Watergate crisis (Jim Skvorc, Summit HS in Colorado)
• A sample 8th or 9th-grade lesson plan about pioneer trail dairies (Robert Mulick, Lowell Scott MS in Idaho)
• Using Children’s Literature about the Great Depression (Carol Hurst)
• Using the children’s book “Letting Swift River Go” in elementary classrooms (Carol Hurst)
• High school lesson plans incorporating letters to Eleanor Roosevelt (New Deal Network)
• Additional enrichment activities about the Depression and the New Deal (New Deal Network)
• Lesson plan ideas for a unit titled “Immigration Builds a Nation” (Education World)

In the next 2 weeks we will focus on the social history of Worcester in the Progressive era. We’ll read one outstanding study, and you’ll try your hand at a digital social history project.

Week 4
9. Mon 2/9 – Workers in Worcester
Reading: Rosenzweig, Eight Hours, Parts I and II (“Context” and “Culture”)

Here’s a chance for us to combine our growing knowledge of urban working class life with a well-written, detailed local history of the city right under our nose. Roy Rosenzweig earned his PhD from Harvard in 1978, and was a professor of history at WPI here in Worcester. After writing Eight Hours, he got interested in the possibilities of digital history. He wrote one of the first electronic textbooks, a CD-ROM documenting ordinary Americans’ contributions to US History, called “Who Built America?” and he founded the Center for History and New Media at George Mason University. He pioneered digital history both as a way to preserve historical resources, and as a forum for making history more accessible. He died in 2007; more about his life and work here.

On Monday we’ll talk about Worcester as an industrial city 1870-1920. What was made here? Who worked here? Where did they come from? Where did they live?

Read Chapter 1 carefully. You can skim Chapter 2, or focus only on its first 10 pages. For Chapter 3, jot some notes about how there were different “ethnic” Fourths of July – you don’t need to read it too closely.

10. Wed 2/11 – Workers in Worcester, Part II
Reading: Rosenzweig, Eight Hours, Parts III and IV (“Conflict” and “Culture, Conflict and Change”)

Read the rest of the book for our Wednesday discussion. If you don’t have time to read the entire rest of the book, do this: Choose one chapter from Part III (either Chapter 4, 5, or 6) to read more closely than the other two. And choose one chapter from Part IV to read more closely. Discussion will focus specifically on the following questions:

• How did Rosenzweig use sources to construct a portrait of workers in Worcester?
• What changes over time are documented here? What caused these changes?
• What was it like to live in Worcester at this time period? How do we know?
• What is Rosenzweig’s overall argument?
• How will we go about researching Worcester in the same time period?



11. Fri 2/13 – Field Trip to Worcester Historical Museum.

We will be using the Edwards Street Temporary Home and Day Nursery collection. You’ll select one envelope (i.e. one family), digitize and document the envelope’s contents, and prepare to add it to the DigitalWorcester online archive.



Week 5 (No class on Monday the 16th)


12. Wed 2/18 – Digital Project day

We will process and create the metadata for our digital project materials. We will meet in our regular classroom, but then will spend most of the classtime in one of the computer classrooms in Sullivan so we can each work at a computer.



13. Fri 2/20 – Discussion Day & Clean up Loose Ends

We will discuss our digital findings & explore what’s in the DigitalWorcester archive, and finish adding/uploading our new content (no student presentations today).

6. Mon 2/2 – Labor and Gender

Begin reading the Brandeis Brief online. Also, familiarize yourself with the following terms or cases: Muller v. Oregon (1908), Lochner v. New York (1905), liberty of contract, Triangle Shirtwaist Fire of 1911, Louis Brandeis.


7. Wed 2/4 - Discuss “Brandeis Brief in Muller v. Oregon”

What “extra-legal” data did Brandeis use?
Why did he develop this unusual style of legal brief?
What can we social historians learn (maybe by accident) from his information?
Why has this brief become important in legal practice?
How did Brandeis find and compile his information?
What was the effect of his documentation on the case?
On a recent feminist lawyer’s blog, one lawyer criticized this brief for being full of “paternalistic drivel.” Do you agree?


8. Fri 2/6 – Presentation Day #1

If this is your week, start at the sites below early in the week, where you will find useful & juicy information on women and work in the Progressive era (1880-1930).

Discovering American Women’s History Online

Women Working, 1800-1930 – especially the photographs in the Baker Business Library Collection, under “Browse the Collection” –> “By Photographs”

Connecticut Women and Work

Calhoun Industrial School, Alabama Cyanotype Album

Women’s History on InfoPlease (although ignore the ads) –> “Work”

Triangle Shirtwaist Fire Virtual Exhibit (Kheel Center)


Your in-class presentation should be about 5 minutes long. It can introduce us to a wonderful online resource, be a Powerpoint presentation, a group exercise, a game, an activity, a discussion…

We won’t meet today, so we’ll discuss the Gutman essay on Friday. (Part One is here, Part Two is here). The assignment for the response paper is here and that paper is due in class on Friday.

Looking ahead, next week we will discuss the “Brandeis Brief” in the Muller v. Oregon case (1908). It’s long, so plan ahead how to finish it by Wednesday. You can find it online here.

Enjoy your snow day!

1. Wed 1/21 – course introduction – no assigned reading

2. Fri 1/23 – what is social history? – Discussion Day

Reading: an article from the Journal of Social History & prepare to discuss it in class (see assignment handout).

Issues of the JSH from 1996-2002 are on the library shelves in the periodical section (by journal title)

Or, for online:

Browse the index of the JSH here (note this is not the full article, just an index)

To find an article from the JSH in full-text (1974-present), go to the WSC library homepage –> Articles and Databases –> Academic Search Complete –> log in with your WSC username and password –> Publications (choose from the top tabs) –> Journal of Social History –> select a year from the right-hand list

Be prepared to answer the following questions in our class discussion -

Why did you choose this article? What intrigued you about it?

How does this author define/ explain “social history,” or why would he/she argue that it belongs in the Journal of Social History?

Who are the people being studied? Where/when did they live? Why does their story matter?

What other works of social history scholarship does this article refer to?

What sources does the author use? How are those sources analyzed?

What conclusions does the author draw? Are you convinced? Why or why not?

What questions or suggestions would you have for this author after reading this article?

This course explores the history of ordinary Americans, many of whom left little or no written records of their own. Through those case studies and our class discussion we approach the methodological problem of how to write about “non-famous” people through a series of case studies, and students will develop their own research projects to gain insight into how historians work. The course is suitable for history majors, or anyone interested in American history. It is crosslisted with Women’s Studies. Prereq: one previous history class is recommended.

You will need to purchase three books:

Nancy Walker, Women’s Magazines 1940-1960 (Bedford, ISBN 978-0312102012)

Roy Rosenzweig, Eight Hours for What We Will: Workers and Leisure in an Industrial City 1870-1920 (Cambridge U Press, ISBN 978-0521313971)

Pam Munoz Ryan, Esperanza Rising (Blue Sky Press 2002, ISBN 978-0439120425)

In addition, we will rely on many online materials, including the free US history textbook online at www.digitalhistory.org and the Journal of Social History, available at History Cooperative, or through Academic Search Premier at the WSC library homepage.