A Semester's Worth of History

It's been a rather longer hiatus from bloggerdom than I thought it would be. I didn't post at all in December and haven't posted anything in nearly six weeks. I have no excuses, and perhaps worse than no excuses, I forewent my chance to really post some good ones since I had three weeks with literally nothing to do but eat turkey and stuffing, drink wine and wassail, and watch full seasons of LOST and Star Trek. Instead that's all I did, and though I read a few books I'd been wanting to get through before the new semester began, I also spent a lot of time sleeping till noon and and staying out at night drinking with friends. Poor me, eh? So, I've finished my first semester as a graduate student and am in the process of beginning my second. I thought I'd make my triumphant return to the world of internet posting with a little reflection on that process and what I hope the new year has in store for me in academia.

Firstly, while I haven't been particularly surprised by the workload, the amount of reading I've done over the past four months is pretty staggering. With only two classes, one of which was a graduate/undergraduate mix and thus less intense, plus thesis research (which I did little for, since I haven't even fully settled on a topic yet), the reading was still at a high level. I haven't counted specifically, but I think I read somewhere in the neighborhood of 15,000 pages of text over the course of the semester, totaling somewhere around twenty-five full books and significant portions of perhaps sixty to seventy others. The amount of writing I did was also rather high (higher than usual, from what I've been told), totaling at around 115 pages--two lengthy research papers, five shorter reading analyses, two non-research papers, and two finals. Still, I never felt particularly overwhelmed, and after I mastered the arts of skimming and picking precisely the most important passages of texts without reading them in their entirety, the voluminous content breezed by rather quickly. I also managed to avoid having any serious panic attacks, although the one all-nighter I pulled to finish a 15 page final paper I had not had a chance to work on until the night before it was due, left me gasping for breath somewhere around 3 AM as I had serious doubts I would meet the 10:30 AM deadline. Of course, it all worked out though.

What has this process been like and how has it changed my outlook on the idea of history? I think one of the biggest lessons I've learned thus far is the difference between the study and practice of history. Studying history tends to be easy: you absorb all of the information in front of you by reading and understanding the arguments presented by historians. The practice of history, however, is usually a lot more challenging. One must know the proper research paths to take, how to evaluate the sources (not to mention the necessity of studying language to broaden one's source base), how to recognize the various points of views the authors bring to the table, how to approach history from the theoretical frameworks of the day while never denying the actual information one must find to confirm one's own theories (this of course, does not always happen, which is why one should derive theories after the research). This is a contentious topic in history, as many historians have been accused (and rightly so) of simply searching for information that confirms their arguments. I think the biggest difference between studying history as an undergraduate and studying it as a graduate student is the amount of theory and criticism employed at this level. This seems obvious in retrospect, but it never dawned on me as an undergraduate that this aspect of historical study was missing from my education. As an undergraduate, for the most part, one studies history, in the words of the founder of the professional history, "wie es eigenlich gewessen ist" or "as it actually happened." That is not to say that controversy over interpretation is not acknowledged, but in general, professors lecture, students take notes as authoritative, and papers and tests are written and taken to prove that a certain level of knowledge has been achieved. Not so, graduate school.

Most of the classes we take are on the theory and philosophy of history, rather than on the accumulation of knowledge. It is essentially assumed that you will do that sort of legwork on your own, and when class time arrives, the goal is not to regurgitate these facts, but to argue your case based on the evidence you've amassed. While this may not seem like earth shattering information (and it's not), I do find it interesting that history seems to be one of the few disciplines that is taught this way. Theory and criticism are not at all a part of the undergraduate experience. To me, this is a bit like being a biology major and never being introduced to evolutionary theory, or studying philosophy without ever understanding what metaphysics or epistemology are. I also received a bachelor's degree in English, and after the first few introductory courses, the coursework became rather theoretical to some degree, or at least we were initiated into the vocabulary of the trade. I had two courses on literary criticism as an undergraduate. Courses are rarely even offered on historical criticism or historiography at the undergraduate level.

Shortly after entering the program, a second year graduate student, following an engaging discussion on how to be a historian, told me that "You will find out rather quickly what type of historian you are," by which he meant that the theories we accept and the theories we regard as bullshit will differentiate themselves rather early in our career. So far, I'm not entirely sure that I agree. Perhaps it's my moderate personality or my ability to find the positives and negatives in modes of discourse or perhaps I'm just wishy-washy, but I have not quite found any particular historical framework that I feel is either the theoretical approach to take, nor have I found any that I feel to be complete bunk. One recent trend in historical studies is, since the late 1970s and early 80s, postmodernism, which is extraordinarily difficult to define. As far as history is concerned, postmodern theory treats "truth" (and oftentimes fact as well) as entirely subjective and tends to view historical thinking and writing as more of a humanities study than a social science. In this ideational structure, literary criticism and linguistic theory inform history more than research into the past itself. Everything, as they say, is "text". While I believe that the vocabulary and rhetoric employed by postmodernism has enriched historical study, I think that the denial of factual information has done something of a disservice to the profession itself. One of my major problems with postmodernism has little to do with the more arcane and jargon-laden arguments set forth by the theoreticians and more to do with the imprecise definitions utilized by the field. I plan on writing a bit more on this later, but for now, suffice to say that, in my view, postmodernism contradicts itself by making a "truth claim" that "there is no truth" and by failing to understand the interplay between subjectivity and objectivity. Western thought in general, but postmodernist thought (and for that matter scientific, rationalist thought) in particular, regards subjectivity and objectivity as essentially binary or entirely separate from one another, rather than as a continuum, which I believe they are. That is to say, something is not either objective or subjective, but most forms of knowledge are somewhere along the continuum, and one can observe facts and make arguments that are more or less objective than other arguments. A denial of all objectivity (which many postmodernists do) is, to me, as illogical as denying all subjectivity as well. In any case, some postmodernists historians have an "anything goes" attitude, which celebrates bias, in a sense, by saying that since no one is really ever capable of true objectivity, we should embrace subjectivity. For my part, as a historian, I think it would be absurd to claim that we don't approach our subject with bias, but it would be equally absurd not to mitigate these tendencies and attempt to rely on evidence (and where it takes us, even if it takes us somewhere we do not wish to go) at all costs.

Finally, it's been an interesting experience working with undergraduates. I've had some contact with different levels of education via my two years as a substitute teacher in high school and middle school and my summer grading standardized test for the state of Kentucky. So far, the undergraduate experience has been less trying on my nerves but no less challenging intellectually. Obviously, in dealing with a higher level of student, one expects a higher degree of intelligence, writing ability, behavior, and so on. For the most part, this is true. As a teaching assistant, I haven't had any discipline problems with any students in my classes. I have to say though, that while many times students surprise me with their lack of certain basic sets of knowledge, most of them generally seem as competent in historical knowledge as I would expect the average college freshman to be. The class I TAed for had around 120 students, and their grades ended up following a pretty standard bell curve, though the apex of the parabola hovered around the low-B rather than the mid-C mark. Probably around a dozen students in the class were able to write sparkling essays in relatively polished prose that demonstrated a fair amount of knowledge, just as there were around a dozen students who believed that Italy was Sweden, the French Revolution occurred in the Early Middle Ages, and AIDS caused the decline and fall of the Roman Empire. And this is after listening to a semester's worth of lectures. Most students who can't handle it drop after the first few weeks but it's not uncommon for students who think that the Mediterranean Sea is named the "Sea of Calamity" to be there taking the final on the last day of class along with the history majors.

I look forward to my future semester. I have a class called Hermits and Heretics: The History of the Medieval Church, 300-1450, which looks promising, and I'm furthering my historiographical studies with both European and non-Western historiography as well as American historiography. Plus, I'll begin my thesis in earnest this semester through the prospectus course all first years must take in their second semester. I still don't know exactly what my thesis will be on, though it will almost certainly be on a late medieval or early modern history of science topic. Currently some ideas include looking at the evolution of the soul/body to mind/body dualism among natural philosophers from, say, Albertus Magnus to Rene Descartes. Another idea is to pick one country during a particular time period (or, after taking Hermits and Heretics, perhaps the Church) and look at its specific legal attitude towards astrology. I have a few others but haven't fleshed them out yet. I guess that's what the prospectus class is for. You can be sure, dear reader, that, like it or not, I'll probably be posting about it along the way. It's good to be back to the world of blogging and the world of academia.

A Short Hiatus from Bloggerdom and Some Things to Come

I'm currently in the home stretch of my first semester as a graduate student in history, which, as you can imagine, is why I've been away from the blogging world over the past couple of weeks. In fact, not counting the revised papers on witchcraft I posted here, I haven't done much of anything original since late September. Obviously, I've got a lot to do, so I probably won't post again until the semester is over around the third week of December, but I thought I'd give a quick preview of some things I intend to get up here on the site before the end of 2009.

Firstly, I have several book reviews I've written over the past few months and a few from over a year ago that I would like to post. I don't really do book reviews too often, but it's something that academic historians do for shorter works in journals, so I'd like to get some up here. I recently read a really fascinating work for my witchcraft class called The Devil's Dominion, about the existence of magic and its integration into religion in Puritan New England in the seventeenth century. It really put he events in Salem in political, religious, and cultural context and really breaks down some stereotypes about not only the ultra-rigidity of Puritan religious beliefs but also the myth of the strict homogeneity of their colonies. I know, it's one more post on witchcraft, but since it has to do with Puritan New England, I can loosely tie it to Thanksgiving. I'll post it soon. Some other books, history (though most is not terribly current) and otherwise, that I'll review soon include a a biography of Alexander the Great, an examination of the military explanation for the fall of the Roman Empire, some of the works of Arnold Toynbee, a few works on the history of astrology and magic, as well as some Jungian stuff. Like many other things I post here, these will mostly be revised versions of things I have written for myself in the past.

Secondly, I have two pretty big papers coming up and once the semester is over and I've gotten back professor comments and made the necessary adjustments I'd like to post them here. The shorter paper I am writing compares Giordano Bruno and Domenico Scandella, two victims of the Inquisition in Italy in the late sixteenth century. By examining their respective cosmologies and heresies, I hope to draw some conclusions about the similarities and differences between elite and common conceptions of the cosmos at a time when a multitude of contradictory ideas proliferated. Scandella, a literate Friulian miller, was a man on the margins of society. He was exposed to cultural diversity and pluralism in his profession, benefited intellectually from the rise of the printed word, and performed an integral function within his peasant community though he was often alienated from it for his unorthodox ideas. Bruno was a peripatetic scholar who never resided in one location longer than a few years, and consequently, he was often a mistrusted figure in his adoptive lands. He advocated Hermetic and Neoplatonic philosophy, and his early acceptance of the Copernican heliocentric theory, though it had little to do with his eventual trial and execution, has earned him a place in the history of science. For these reasons, among others, both figures aroused the suspicions of the Inquisition. By positioning these two historical personages in the philosophical, religious, and socio-cultural settings of late sixteenth century Europe, I seek to better understand why their cosmologies were so offensive to the Church and why both were condemned for heresy. I also hope to submit this paper to a graduate student academic conference at North Carolina State. The longer paper is also a comparative paper, and I've written about the topic many other times, so I won't go into too much detail. In short, I'm comparing Andrew Dickson White - a late nineteenth century historian and president of Cornell University who wrote an extremely influential work on the history of science and theology, in which he argued that they have historically been enemies - with modern historian of science David C. Lindberg, who represents the modern school of thought that neither warfare nor harmony accurately depicts their relationship. Both these papers exemplify my general interests in history and I'll post them later in December.

Finally, I'm coming up on the one year anniversary of this bog's inaugural post, which is in the first week of January next year. This blog started, in part, due to the fact that I made it my new Year's Resolution at the end of 2008 to write more and I decided a blog would be the best testing ground for that commitment. I think the results have been pretty good though I am going to far well short of my one hundred post goal. I intend to write at least one post reflecting on my year of blogging and what I'd like to accomplish in the world of writing in the coming year. With my first semester of grad school almost behind me, I also want to write a bit on how that process has changed me, what I've learned, and how I have interpreted the lessons of graduate school. I don't necessarily want to write so much about history, but what higher education means to me and how this type of schooling is, in most ways, entirely different from all other education I've received up to now in my life. So, for the future, you can look forward (I hope) to some book reviews and some actual normal blog posts that have to do more with my life and less to do with my increasingly abstract thoughts. Enjoy!

Update and a Quick Preview

I haven't posted anything for a month and really don't have an excuse. Summer would have been the perfect time for me to sit down at the computer and write blog after blog but it didn't happen. I think it's partially because I have had virtually no routine all summer long and blogging has been one of those things that's gotten lost in the shuffle. So, even though I think everyone who reads this blog already knows the stuff I'm about to type, here's a quick synopsis of the last month and introduction to the next six or so posts I intend to write.

July was in some ways a really busy month and in some ways a really boring one. I spent most of the month working at the one part-time job I was able to get--grading the fifth grade social studies portion of the standardized test for the state of Kentucky. Suffice to say that it was simultaneously hilarious and depressing. The job was filled primarily with educators making some extra cash during their summer recesses, employees of the temp agency Kelly Services who had recently finished up other assignments, and people like myself, who had enough college credits to qualify for the job, and needed something to do for a month or two. I signed a "confidentiality agreement" stating that I wouldn't reveal any student responses (despite the fact that all of the responses were anonymous), and even though I've passed some of them along in private conversation, I feel it's probably not appropriate to post them here. But, for a taste, let me just say that around 15% of Kentucky fifth graders seem to think that Martin Luther King, Jr., freed the slaves, spoke at Abraham Lincoln's funeral, and single-handedly ended the Civil War between North and South America.

The only other major thing that happened in July was that Kirsten and I took a trip down to South Carolina to visit Clemson, look for an apartment, and for Kirsten to look for a speech-language pathologist position. We have, in fact, secured an apartment in Central, South Carolina, which is about a 12 minute drive form campus. The Upstate, or Upcountry, region of South Carolina is quite beautiful. It is essential the far southern tip of the Appalachian Mountains and the Blue Ridge chain is only about 25 minutes north of where we'll be living. We already went hiking once and it was gorgeous. Plus, though the area is sparsely populated by most standards, we are less than 30 miles from Greenville, SC, which has over 100,000 people and around 20 miles north of Anderson, which is about half of that. Clemson is extremely beautiful as well, and a bit different from what I'm used to. Indiana University and Michigan State are both very large state schools of nearly 40,000 students, and Clemson's student body is only around 17,000, but it was the size of the campus, which one could walk across in maybe 20 minutes (as opposed to nearly an hour at the others), that really amazed me. It is small but exactly what I want a college campus to look like: quaint, idyllic, and quintessentially Southern in style. Magnolia trees line the streets, and the buildings are largely an old Southern colonial style (from what I can tell, I'm not that great with architecture) with deep red brick walls, and columns on the larger buildings. I got to meet some of the staff in the history department as well as a very helpful graduate student. All in all, it was a pleasant experience and I look forward to beginning my scholarly journey in just a few more weeks.

Finally, I want to briefly preview the next few blogs I'm post. Those of you who are Facebook friends may remember a little over a year ago when I posted a six part series of notes on medieval philosophy (or, likely, that you don't). In any case, I am planning on reposting them here over the next few days, not so much so that people will read them again, but more for my benefit, because I was rather proud of my work on them and there are some edits I would like to make, some extra research I'd like to do, some hyperlinks I'd like to insert, and some intellectual avenues I wouldn't mind strolling down again. If you've read them before, feel free to ignore them, but I'd like to move them to my blog, since it's obviously a far more appropriate place for the content than in Facebook notes. After that, my next blog should be coming to you from the Palmetto State! Hope you had a great summer!

On Discontinuing My Tenure as a Substitute Teacher

Michigan is a tough job market. I knew this when I moved up here with Kirsten in August 2007. After spending two years as a research editor in Louisville, a job that wasn't particularly fulfilling but at least made me feel like I was making use of what before seemed to be a useless English degree, I was hoping for something similar in the Lansing/East Lansing job market. I quickly found that this wouldn't be possible, since most of the employers up here were auto workers, insurance companies, the state government, and the university, none of which either particularly appealed to me or had jobs for me. This is not to mention that, although the economic crisis hadn't yet made its full presence known, Michigan had already been reeling from a declining auto market for years. After three months of fruitlessly searching (the closest I came to a "real" job in mid-Michigan was a legislative clerk in the State Capitol, but they went with someone with more experience and better typing skills), Kirsten casually suggested that I look into substitute teaching. I did, and found the local districts up here to be in dire need of them, so I thought I might give it a shot. After all, at that point I was still considering, albeit half-heartedly, the possibility of teaching secondary education, and I thought this might be a decent test run so to speak. I began substitute teaching middle and high school language arts and social sciences in November 2007 and wound up my tenure just last week in May 2009. Here is what I learned:

Teaching is a lot more than having a specific knowledge set and being able to convey that knowledge in a coherent way to twenty-some-odd students at a time. As a student in public schools, of course, one observes only one sliver of the total work teachers do. Teachers spend an endless amount of time planning, gathering materials, grading, contacting parents, dealing with administrative duties, tutoring, coaching, doing IEPs, etc. (OK, teachers are supposed to do all of these thing - not all of them do, as I have found out). And of course, as a sub, I don't have to do much of any of this. In the worst of circumstances, in fact, most substitute teachers are like jailers, making sure the kids are doing all the work the teacher has left for them, keeping them in the classroom, keeping them from killing one another, and assuring that the teacher's room looks reasonably similar to the one they left. As a random sub, i.e. subbing for a teacher I've never met with kids I've never taught before, I usually didn't do any real teaching, I simply followed a prearranged lesson plan: usually popping in a movie, handing out a worksheet assignment, taking kids to the library or computer lab to do work on their own, etc. It's very hands off and apart from answering basic questions and telling kids not to throw things or yell, the interaction is minimal. This is especially true at the high school level, where subs are often not expected to have the knowledge necessary to conduct class (God help me if I ever had to provide instruction for a Calculus class). The middle school level is a bit different, and I often did find myself providing instruction, but even this was few and far between.

The most interesting days were the days when the teacher did in fact leave teaching plans. There was a seventh grade English teacher for whom I became the primary sub, and every time I subbed for her, I was required to read to the students, discuss plot points, reading comprehension, themes, etc., grade their homework and tests, and talk them through all of their assignments. It was daunting at first and was made no easier by the fact that it was among the most rambunctious and ornery group of students I've ever taught. For example, I once had to send a student to the office for not only possessing a Hustler magazine, but opening it and reading it in class. I also sent one to the office for bursting out into an obscene rap song in the middle of a spelling test, and who, when I politely asked him to stop, jumped on his desk and began singing more loudly. In fact, it may have been the same kid. . . If I learned anything from this class, and others like it, its that some students want to get a rise of subs so badly, they're more than willing to go to detention for it. At first, I think I played right into their hands, getting angry and yelling at them, but since this is exactly what they want, it only makes things worse. By the end of my tenure as that teacher's primary sub, I simply did my best Ben Stein impression and quietly told him in a monotone to sit out in the hallway.

I am a short man who is not in particularly good shape, so I usually did not command a great deal of respect from the start. Subbing is one of the most thankless jobs one can have, and most of the students know that you have no real power, short of taking their names down so the teacher can grill them when they return. And, I have had my fair share of at best ridiculous and at worse dangerous encounters with students. I once had a book thrown at my head in the middle of class - and not a paperback, a good thousand page, three or four pound Biology text. Fortunately, I was never punched or otherwise assaulted by a student, but I got the feeling by the look in some of their eyes that they did wish to inflict physical harm on me. I guess that means I was doing my job. Most of my most difficult moments involved losing control of the classroom or having students totally call me out on my bluffs. I once subbed for an eighth grade choir class that had nearly sixty students. It was all but impossible to keep them quiet while we watched the movie the teacher left for them. There was one group of seven or eight prissy little girls (you know the kind) who would not stop talking and disrupting class so I finally told them if they weren't going to be quiet I would send every one of them to time out. Ten minutes or so passed, and I had all but forgotten about what I thought was an empty threat, but one of them was misbehaving so badly that I had little choice but to send her to time out. After that, every other girl came forward and, referencing my earlier threat, said I had to send all of them down. So I did. I wrote out seven passes for time out. Feeling that I had "won", the class proceeded in a relatively calm manner - until I get a call from the time out teacher telling me in a rather annoyed voice that I've sent too many kids down, after which she returned all seven to the class, without further punishment. This was, to be honest, the only time as a sub that I did not get almost full support from the regular teaching staff. I've had a few friends who have subbed, and some have mentioned to me how poorly they were treated by the staff, that they were looked down on and treated as second class citizens. Fortunately, I experienced almost none of this and I have to hand it to the Lansing and East Lansing school districts: their teachers were very kind, professional, and helpful. By far the coolest thing I ever did discipline-wise was completely by accident. I was at the marker board writing down instructions with my back to the class. Without eyes on them, I could tell the class was getting antsy and were probably on the verge of becoming truly disruptive. As I turned around to tell them to be quiet, a paper wad came whizzing towards me. I caught it quite accidentally with one hand without flinching, moving, or changing my expression. It was practically robotic. The class gasped audibly and were then dead silent. I played it cool as if it had been completely purposeful. "Who threw that?" I asked nonchalantly. All eyes in the room slowly pointed at one individual. "Could you please take your things and sit out in the hallway," I said coolly with a slight grin. He complied and the rest of the hour was rather civil. Sometimes the completely random is all you need.

Perhaps the only thing more disheartening than misbehaving students is the lack of intellectual curiosity I've observed by many of them. I'm not necessarily talking about ignorant students; ignorance can be rectified. I'm talking about those who willfully do not wish to learn. This is a very alien concept to me, as I have built essentially my entire life around intellectual curiosity. I subbed for a ninth grade history class on December 7 last year and asked the students if any of them knew what happened on this day in 1941. No one raised their hands. I told them this was the day that the empire of Japan attacked Pearl Harbor drawing the U.S. into World War II. Many of them looked confused. Not only did they not know what this day was, they seemed not to even know that it existed! I once had a history professor who never had us remember dates, because he said continuity and sequence was more import than fixed time, yet he told us "If there's one date in U.S. history I want you to remember, it's this one." I told the students the same thing. One student raised his hand and told me that he didn't care what happened in the past because they were all dead, what they did didn't matter, and we should all just move on. It was the only time I was rendered completely speechless in front of a classroom.

Some moments of ignorance were more innocent and more hilarious than this. I once overheard a student ask "Who is that old guy with the weird mustache that host American Gladiators?" to which five students simultaneously replied "That's Brooke Hogan's dad." Or the student who, thirty minute into watching Back to the Future, asks "Is that the old guy with Parkinson's disease?" Wait to make me feel about a million years old kids! Sometimes the lack of understanding of the continuity of past events is amazing to me too. It's understandable that people who aren't specialists in history wouldn't necessarily know that the Treaty of Westphalia occurred after the Thirty Years War or some other arcane factoid. But I had high school junior ask me if computers were around in the '30s, so I said something like "Well, not what we think of as computers today. The microprocessor hadn't been invented yet, but they did have vacuum tubes, which were rudimentary elements in some of the earliest computers. . ." The blank stare told me this was not the answer she was looking for. So she said, "So they had different computers in the 1830s?" (sigh. . .)

But I shouldn't discuss the bad only. In general, I have to say that I am a bit fearful for this next generation, with a likely smaller and more competitive job market, and the possibility of a lower standard of living. If "the children are our future" I'm not sure the future is a place I want to spend too much time. However, in two years, there were many bright spots and students who gave me hope. I once subbed at an otherwise troubled high school that had an obvious issue with drugs and violence but witnessed the truly amazing conduction of a Taekwondo class with more discipline than I have ever seen from such a large group of teenagers. I also taught a sixth grade social studies class where I gave a lecture on Christopher Columbus' voyages and I had one precocious little student who not only could have given the lecture himself, but actually taught me a few things. He knew the size and shapes of the vessels, what types of sails they used, even how they compared to contemporary Chinese vessels. I was more than impressed and told him so. There was another student in a high school I subbed for who engaged me in one of the most intelligent conversations I've ever had about libertarian politics and the failure of imagining a political spectrum as linear. And, I had the privilege of becoming the designated sub for a special education English teacher, not something I would normally sub, but her students turned out to be some of the best I ever had. And since I subbed for them regularly for a full year, I was able to observe how much better nearly all of them became at understanding what they were reading, writing legibly and coherently, and generally becoming better students. It was humbling. Frankly, it was these exchanges that helped keep me coming back.

All in all, I had a mixed experience as a substitute. The days when classroom management was at the fore of my duties were not good days They were stressful and contributed a great deal to the multitude of gray hairs I now possess and the lack of hair creeping across the top of my head. However, on days that I did get to do some real teaching turned out to be extraordinarily rewarding. There are few things I've found more exhilarating than holding the undivided attention of a classroom that seems to be genuinely interested in what you have to say. In another sense, it also helped me to decide, conclusively, that teaching in secondary education is not for me. The job market and financial prospects for higher education may be worse, but I feel that the intellectual rewards and academic freedom will be well worth it. It has also given me a new found respect for the teachers themselves. Not that I haven't always respected them, but to see what it is that they have to deal with every single day is quite another thing. It takes a certain type of person to be a teacher and I am fairly certain that I am not that type. So, farewell students, teachers, and schools of the Lansing metro areas. I will miss you in spirit, but not in profession.

These "Damnable Superstitions": Legal Double Standards and Cultural Reflections of Witchcraft and Judicial Astrology, ca. 1200-ca. 1600: Introduction

I think that the greatest asset I bring to the table as a soon-to-be graduate student in history is my ability in writing and researching and I said as much in my personal statement. I had decent GRE scores and a pretty good transcript, but it's definitely the writing, researching, and editing that make me a good candidate. What follows is the paper I used as my graduate writing sample, and it has an interesting history. It grew out of a much, much (much) shorter paper I wrote in a senior year class on the late plays of Shakespeare. The original was on the use of astrological discourse and depictions of witchcraft in Shakespearean plays (King Lear, Macbeth, A Winter's Tale, and Troilus and Cressida in particular) and how Shakespeare had to make the witches villainous to escape legal retribution but astrological rhetoric was perfectly acceptable, even though several laws against astrology were current in late Elizabethan England. The conclusion of that paper was that essentially, even though astrology was to some degree illegal in 16th century England, it was popular enough among its people that there was little authorities could do to curb its influence by simply passing a law, and thus it remained in tact, at least as way of speaking about and interpreting events.

For my graduate writing sample, I decided to expand upon the Shakespeare paper I had written, making it even more historically based. Essentially, what resulted was this massive paper (the original was around 8 pages, the current one is 46) that deals with the separate histories of Western witchcraft and astrology, their similar practices despite dissimilar position in the Western European consciousness, and their convergence in popular culture as evinced by writers like Shakespeare. In retrospect, the paper seems a bit too broad, and I think I focus a bit too much on their general histories, perhaps include a few too many unnecessary details, and don't tie together the separate sections of the paper--I think the last section on Shakespeare is probably the strongest section, but it seems somewhat out of place after reading the first two thirds. Many of you who read this blog have already read an earlier version of this paper. This is probably at least the tenth draft and it differers significantly from that one in some important ways: gone are some of the more general descriptions of both astrology and witchcraft as well as some of the less historically relevant literary aspects from Macbeth, and there is a greater emphasis on primary sources, especially the Malleus Maleficarum and the works of King James, Regino of Prum, Charlemagne, Augustine, and Isodore of Seville. I think it's a better paper, though still a little broad. As I mentioned, it's extraordinarily long, so I'm going to post it in seven or eight parts over the course of the next week or so. It is unaltered from the original except that I have removed the footnotes and reinserted them in quasi-MLA format throughout the text, except in the case of relatively important information which I have attempted to reintegrate into the main body. I may or may not post the bibliography later. Enjoy!

These "Damnable Superstitions":
Legal Double Standards and Cultural Reflections
of Witchraft and Judicial Astrology, ca. 1200-ca. 1600

Introduction: "Damnable Superstitions"

In 1601 the Englishman John Chamber, in his diatribe against astrology titled A Treatise Against Iudicial Astrologie, wrote, “Witchcraft…sometime findeth now and then some hard entertainment, as it well deserueth. But this damnable superstition [judicial astrology], which dishonoreth God, polluteth heauen, deceiueth and seduceth men, goeth without touch or check; the Astrologer escaping, while the Witch is punished, may not that be well said?” (Chamber, C2v) The fact that men and women were engaged in similar applications of the occult, but were regarded differently in terms of legal and social status, was oftentimes the case in Elizabethan England. Chamber’s equation with astrology and witchcraft is a fact sometimes overlooked by historians of both. While the two had separate origins and different historical paths, the parallels in practice, purpose, and their positions in popular social consciousness cannot be ignored.

Witchcraft had long been condemned both by religious and political establishments throughout medieval and early modern history, but the similarities between it and astrology have largely been overlooked due to the institutionalized place of the latter in Western scholarly society. Despite the fact that the judicial branch of astrology—that concerned with divination, horoscopy, and the foretelling of the future—was censured to various degrees throughout its history in Western civilization, it remained an edifice of scientific discourse from ancient times until well into the seventeenth century. In general, astrology was accepted because it was practiced principally by learned and noble men from the same socio-economic class as those who also created the laws governing its performance, and it is no coincidence that very similar acts committed by women were condemned, many times for no other reason than the fact that they were perpetrated by females and regarded as heretical (Barstowe, 16). The patriarchal society of Europe was maintained by excluding these works of women, however comparable they were. As we shall observe in this study, the origins of these two disciplines are poles apart in terms of their cultural and ideological geneses; however, the disapproval of both in the Later Middle Ages and early modern period is a fact we can explain when we examine what kept them apart: 1) the masculine/feminine duality rife in pre-modern Europe and the misogynation stemming from this; 2) the accommodation of astrology within Aristotelian-Ptolemaic cosmology, and its influence on the Christian attitude toward the physical universe; 3) the microcosm-macrocosm relationship; 4) the heretical nature of the late medieval interpretation of witchcraft versus astrology; 5) and the early Christian distaste for nearly all things pagan from which the mythology of witchcraft ultimately arises. This last point excluded Greco-Roman learning, into which astrology was incorporated, and Christianity was able to syncretize. This study will track the categorization and punishment of witchcraft, the modes of astrological discourse in the later Middle Ages and early modern times, their similarity in some practices despite contradictory legal standards, and the positions of both in the popular consciousness of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth century as evinced by the writings of William Shakespeare in particular.

Graduate School Ahead: Taking Stock - A Short Intellectual History of How I Got Where I Am Now

As of today, I have officially accepted the offer of a graduate assistantship in the History Master's program at Clemson University. This is, obviously, a big step for me. Part of the reason I chose the school was the opportunity they are giving me to be a graduate assistant and although their department's strengths aren't quite where I imagine my focus will eventually lie, their diversity as a program as well as the fact that, as a school with only an MA program, I'll be able to work more closely with professors who have an excellent record of getting students into good PhD granting programs, helped me make my decision. And, of course, with these tough economic times, it doesn't hurt that their financial package was the most generous of the five schools to which I was accepted. It really was a tough decision, and I was rather meticulous about it. I was also accepted to Western Michigan University and St. Louis University, both of which have extremely well-renowned medieval history programs, and although neither offered me a financial package, it took a lot of gumption to turn them down. I don't think I'm rationalizing, trying to make it all about the money, because I do honestly like the fact that at Clemson I still have several options of study. Medieval Studies is certainly where my heart lies, but I'm also interested in Late Antiquity and the Early Modern era as well as the history and philosophy of science, and the fact that I'm basically being given two more years to really hone the craft and pin down a more focused area of study is nice. I'm aware of the fact that graduate studies entails an intensive focus, especially for the dissertation, but I really hope that I can avoid was historian Norman Davies lamented about scholars knowing "more and more about less and less." Essentially, I am hoping to avoid this:
Plus, a graduate assistantship will, presumably, look pretty good on a PhD application. And the PhD is where a greater "fit" in university will mean even more - so a more medieval focus may lead me to a place like Fordham or Toronto whereas a history and philosophy of science focus could take me some place like Pittsburgh, Wisconsin, or one of the University of California schools.

When I sit back and take stock, I sometimes can't believe that I am where I am. I don't mean that I don't believe in myself or that I think I'm being given more than I'm due. It's just that over the course of my lifetime, I have been enamored by various areas of study and sometimes I feel like it was simply happenstance that I got into history in sort of the right place at the right time, so to speak. Briefly, here is my intellectual background from birth to now:

As a young child I was always known as "the science kid" by my parents and relatives because of my interests in dinosaurs and astronomy. I was interested in other things that nerdy kids were into as well: animals (especially sea creatures and insects), the space program, cool things like volcanoes and earthquakes. For a very long time I assumed I was going to go to college and become a paleontologist or astronomer or biologist or chemist (though, interestingly, I never particularly wanted to be an astronaut). This continued well into middle school and the first couple of years of high school, though my interests certainly broadened. I always loved maps as a kid and was always fairly good at geography. I developed into a pretty great reader and really got into science fiction when I was 11 or 12. And I started playing drums, was pretty good at that too, and had even more on my plate because of it. Still, science was always the focus. Even as late as sophomore year of high school, when I went to a college visit at IU, Bloomington, I enrolled in the "physical sciences" focus and got tours of the Chemistry building and went to several lectures given by astrophysicists and cosmologists. But, in the reality of high school, I ran into one major problem: math. I was great at math as a kid, but somewhere around junior year, the limits of my abilities seemed to catch up with me, and I slowly and painfully realized that I probably wasn't really cut out for the rigors of a scientific career. So where did that leave me. I was still playing drums, and my parents, and especially my guitar-playing former rock-band member father, were beginning to coax me towards a career in music. As much as I loved playing, I knew even as an adolescent that that was not the life for me (how many kids have that experience? parents want you to be a musician, but you don't?). I began to fall into writing. I'd been writing since I was little kid, stories, plays, poems, lots of science fiction (mirroring my interest in the literature), and it began to seem a natural extension of my interests: science led to science fiction, reading science fiction led to writing science fiction, writing leads to. . . journalism! I started as a journalism major in college and almost immediately regretted it. One problem I found as I took journalism courses in college was that I felt like I was being taught in a "how-to" manner without having the requisite knowledge to make anything out of that. Plus, when you learn to write newspaper articles, you're taught to dumb your writing down to sixth grade level, and it was just awful to write that way. Several friends, and even an advisor or two, suggested that I switch to English since it offered a similar degree (many newspapermen came out of English programs) and I would be able to read (which I loved), write more than simplified prose, and gain a more knowledge based education as opposed to a "how-to" one. Yet, even in English, I felt I was missing something, and I discovered that I enjoyed the historical context of the literature more than I enjoyed the literature itself, especially medieval and early modern literature. One of the reasons history seemed to make the most sense for me, once I was a few years into college, is because it seemed to be the most all-encompassing of any of the courses of study I took. History is, obviously such a broad topic, and my focus eventually centered, as I mentioned before (and if you've ever read anything on this blog you probably already know) on the Middle Ages and the history of science. For those of you keeping score, that goes: science --> science fiction reading --> science fiction writing --> writing in general --> journalism writing --> English literature --> History --> science.

And we've come full circle. . . and it really does feel kind of like I'm a kid again.

Oh, the Humanities!!!

"...medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for."
-John Keating, Dead Poet's Society

I recently read this extraordinarily depressing article from the New York Times describing the state of humanities and liberal arts in higher education and the general decline that is occurring or will occur soon as budget cuts, hiring freezes, and the overall lessening of the value placed upon non-math or science related topics becomes the norm in college curricula across the country. The information in the essay isn't really new. Studies of literature, art, history, philosophy, and other related fields have been declining since at least the early 80s and are especially susceptible to decline during tough economic times and wars - as Arthur Miller wrote during the Vietnam War, "When the guns boom, the arts die." Today is no exception and in many ways our age is an exemplar of this state of affairs. I was advised by a former professor upon informing him of my decision to pursue graduate studies in history to diversify as much as possible and to focus on topics that are "in vogue" in academia. In terms of pre-modern European history, which, as broadly as I can, describes my interests in geographic and chronological terms, that means things like the Crusades, Western/Islamic relations, women and gender, socio-economics, etc. Fortunately for me, I am interested in these things. It also seems likely that getting some type of minor in global studies or world history is in my best interests. Perhaps, as a friend who recently completed a master's program (albeit in a science field) told me recently, I should simply be content with the fact that I am being offered any funding at all in my pursuit of a humanities degree.

Laurie: "...I've decided to major in philosophy."
Eric: "That's good because they just opened up that big philosophy factory in Green Bay."
-That '70s Show

As someone who is about to enter graduate school in history, the state of humanities higher education is obviously troubling to me. I have no doubt that historical studies will continue to be an integral part of the college experience, but the shrinking size of college endowments in general and departments in the arts and humanities in particular have placed something of a "burden of proof" on these departments. This is unfortunate. Professors in these fields are tacitly being told by their administrators and board members that to remain pertinent, they must explain why they are as important as, say, engineering or biology. Well, the truth is, in a practical way, they aren't. Or, I should say, at least not in an obvious way. Knowing the ins and outs of St. Anselm's ontological argument won't help you build a bridge and understanding the mimetic theory of pre-modern literature is not going to put a satellite into orbit. This much is obvious. Teachers in the humanities have been arguing for years, and rightfully so, however, that learning critical thinking skills, argumentative skills, analytical writing and reasoning skills, are extremely important for the overall education of a student. Afterall, how can you convince the federal government to fund your scientific research if you can't coherently argue in writing why it's so important? Or, going beyond that, as the article mentions, how do you weigh the moral implications of stem cell research or recombinant DNA or the human genome project without a firm grounding in the last 3000 years or so of Western history and philosophy? These intellectual quests give us reason to keep building bridges and sending up satellites. Perhaps the future of humanities, or perhaps most academic studies, will be further syntheses of seemingly disparate discourses. If humanities cannot survive on their own, perhaps being married to more scientific fields will help: the history of science and the relationships amongst science, philosophy, theology, and religion seem necessary to fostering better understanding in the future. Humanities professors shouldn't have to "prove" their worth to anyone: one step inside an art museum, one page turned of Shakespeare, one note from Beethoven, should be enough to convince us of the merits of a liberal arts education.

"There are obviously two educations. One should teach us how to make a living and the other how to live. Surely these should never be confused in the mind of any man who has the slightest inkling of what culture is. For most of us it is essential that we should make a living...In the complications of modern life and with our increased accumulation of knowledge, it doubtless helps greatly to compress some years of experience into far fewer years by studying for a particular trace or profession in an institution; but that fact should not blind us to another—namely, that in so doing we are learning a trade or a profession, but are not getting a liberal education as human beings."
-James Truslow Adams