(answer: students and instructor alike learn a lot from the experience)
I’ve followed Mark’s ongoing reaction to John J. Miller’s September 26 article in the National Review about the supposed death of academic military history. Underlying Miller’s claim that military history is on its deathbed was the not-so-veiled insinuation that those left-leaning liberal moonbats were responsible for military history’s death. Here’s one excerpt from the article:
“Other types of historians also came under attack — especially scholars of diplomatic, intellectual, and maritime history — but perhaps none have suffered so many casualties as the “drums and trumpets” crowd. “Military historians have been hunted into extinction by politically active faculty members who think military history is a subject for right-wing, imperialistic warmongers,” says Robert Bruce, a professor at Sam Houston State University in Texas.”
I thought this was rather an odd claim. As an undergraduate, I took a modern European history course from one of Miller’s “tenured radicals.” In the class we read about strategy and tactics of Europe’s continental wars, Queen Victoria’s dirty colonial wars in Africa and India, and of course we also read about World War I and World War II. In addition to this reading, our professor lectured on aspects of the social history of European warfare: I was deeply moved by his lecture on the experiences of soldiers during World War I. As a college senior I also took a course on the American Revolution, in which the military history of the Revolution was a major topic. I suppose one could call my professor in that course a tenured left-winger as well, yet we finished the course well-versed in the reasons for the failure of Benedict Arnold’s invasion of Quebec, and for Burgoyne’s defeat at Saratoga. Neither of these liberal professors rook the stance that military history was bad, or that learning military history somehow makes students become militarists.
I never took a course that was purely about military history, but I like to think I graduated from college with a tripartite understanding about military history: 1) that military history is an important branch of historical learning, 2) that military history involves not only the “traditional” topics of strategy and tactics, weaponry, training, supplies, etc., but also the social history of the military experience, and 3) that military history can be comfortably and logically included in courses that aren’t explicitly about military history.
I learned this lesson from my tenured radical professors so well that as I prepared to teach my own course this fall about the American Revolution that I resolved to spend at least two weeks (six class periods) on the military history of the Revolution. I opened the mini-unit with a lecture titled “Citizen Soldiers” which was about the formation of the Continental Army: how soldiers were enlisted, how officers were selected, the virtues and vices of irregular forces, and the (attempted?) professionalization of the army under the auspices of Washington and von Steuben. Students then had to read the portions of Robert Middlekauf’s The Glorious Cause that deal with the war (in fact, I chose Middlekauf’s book over other undergraduate-suitable surveys of the Revolution precisely because it discusses the war in detail). We then had two class periods of discussion about the war in the North—basically a discussion of strategy and tactics from 19 April 1775 through Burgoyne’s surrender at Saratoga on 17 October 1777. Then, since the theater of warfare shifted southward, we spent two class periods discussing the war from the British invasion of Georgia in the winter of 1778-1779 through Cornwallis’s surrender at Yorktown on 19 October 1781. We concluded with a class period discussing the experiences of the Revolutionary soldier, using James Kirby Martin’s edition of Joseph Plumb Martin’s 1830 memoirs. We also spent a class period discussing the Revolution on the homefront, and later in the semester I’ll do a lecture on the dissolution of the Continental army, on soldiers’ pay and pensions, and the controversy over the Order of the Cincinnati.
I think my students could discuss with any military historian questions such as “why were the cannon the rebels captured at Ticonderoga and Crown Point important to ending the siege of Boston?” or “in what ways were irregular forces important to the defeat of Burgoyne in 1777?” or “how did French naval support help the American Revolutionary effort?” They could also discuss major figures from the war: Gage, Clinton, Burgoyne, Cornwallis, and the Howe brothers for Britain, and Washington, Lee, Lincoln, Greene, Gates, and others for the American side.
After I read Miller’s article, I was willing to bet there are a lot of historians out there like me: that is, professional historians who are trained as intellectual, social, or cultural historians who have no formal training in military history but who teach military history in their courses when appropriate anyway. I’m not terribly comfortable teaching military history for that reason; no one has ever taught me how to do it, but like many professional historians, I decided to teach myself so that I could teach my students. It took a lot of extra reading on my part, and even some rehearsals of my discussions, before I taught the war. I searched high and low for decent maps, memorized dates, and asked my senior colleague for advice on reading. Even with all this preparation, one of my students caught me in an error about cannonball size—I looked it up afterwards and my student was quite right.
I think the question then becomes not, as Miller would have it, “how soon will military history be dead?” but rather, how can we teach today’s historians how to teach military history as an integral part of their courses? We’ve done this with other aspects of history (for example, many historians simply now include women’s history in college classes as a matter of course, even if they aren’t actually trained to do women’s history). Mark is at work on a solution to this problem, which I believe he’ll be posting about shortly. I’d also like to entertain readers’ thoughts and ideas in the comments.
15 Comments
Rebecca,
My tutelage under that same set of so-called ‘tenured radicals’ has produced similar results in my own teaching (although in World History you naturally end up talking about a different set of wars.) I was assigned Denis Winter’s _Death’s Men_ in the first history class I took as a freshman. That, and other courses, had a great enough impression upon me that discussions of Military History as Social History have been reflexive since I began teaching.
Pinch me, I even found the time to explain infantry squares this semester. . .
Cheers,
Mike Davidson
As always in the ‘History Wars’ (we have our versions here in Australia), exaggeration for effect is the coin of articles like Miller’s. Some of the points he makes are not unreasonable in themselves, at least from my regular observation of the American university scene (and elsewhere closer to home), but he doesn’t let inconvenient detail get in the way of a good prejudice.
That being said, and while taking everything that Rebecca wrote on board, I think perhaps that she was a little fortunate in her undergraduate experience. I went through a four year degree program at the Australian National University (admittedly 20 plus years ago, but in the top 2 or 3 universities in this country), and had to introduce military subject matter myself if I wanted to study it. A course on the French Revolution and Napoleon that made no mention of the developments in the art of war? – they managed it. In Australian history the world wars were essentially about the home front, while the war in Vietnam was reduced to the anti-conscription movement. When I was looking for a supervisor for my 4th year sub-thesis, I was told very dismissively by the 4th year coordinator that she had no idea what military historians *did*, making it very clear that whatever it was it was illegitimate. Such folk do exist. They aren’t the majority (I hope), they aren’t the norm, but you only have to run into one or two of them to seriously spoil your undergraduate experience.
As a military historian I take the same tack as Rebecca, but in reverse. I teach military history but drum it into my students that context and culture are the key determinants, that why Americans, for example, approach war in the way they do has its origins in the early colonial experience, among others, and that to properly understand the place of war and the military in a society and culture they also have to understand that society and culture, whether their own or someone else’s.
I look forward to Mark’s forthcoming posting on this.
This morning I sent John J. Miller of National Review the following email. I include it here because it introduces Rebecca to those who may not know her, and sets up the background to her post:
I think you’ll be interested in this “guest post” by Rebecca Goetz , a recently minted Harvard PhD who’s now an assistant prof at Rice University. She’s an historian of early America with emphasis on American religion and the history of race. I’ve never met her, though we both contribute to Cliopatria and I’m familiar with her personal blog, which she’s kept since 2002 and which led to her publication of a significant article on blogging in the Chronicle of Higher Education. (For all the academy’s political liberalism, it’s astonishing how hidebound they can be about innovations like blogging.)
Rebecca recently contacted me after a student took issue with her coverage of the 1777 Saratoga campaign. It was odd: she had discussed the campaign in terms of the battles of Freeman’s Farm, Bemis Heights, and the eventual surrender at Saratoga–events that took about a month to unfold from start to finish (September 19 – October 17). The student complained that all these events ought properly to be called “the battle of Saratoga.” It’s sometimes sloppily referred to that way, but Rebecca’s presentation was much more accurate and precise. The student evidently fathomed himself better versed in military history than Rebecca, so you’d think the situation would be reversed, with Rebecca talking sweepingly about “Saratoga” and the student insisting on spelling out the details of the two battles and surrender. Anyway, not being trained as a military historian, Rebecca asked me for a reality check. That led to a brief exchange which I encouraged Rebecca to refine into a guest post. I’m going to cross post it to H-War, and I’ll be curious to see what response it generates.
Mike, I read that book for Steve Hochstadt. He hadn’t assigned it that year, but when I expressed interest in writing a paper about soldiers in WWI, he recommended it and I loved it.
Another Batesie has reminded me via email that my sophomore year History Hell (historiography for the uninitiated!) focused on interpretations of Benedict Arnold’s March to Quebec, for which we read and investigated much military history.
Jeff, I was indeed fortunate in my undergraduate experience in many ways; my main point was to demonstrate that my top-thirty small liberal arts college alma mater does not fit Miller’s left-liberal mold.
Mark, thanks for letting me post, and let me know what the response is on H-War!
Just a small anecdote. I took a class at OSU on the French Revolution longer ago than I care to admit. The instructor knew the social and political aspects forwards and backwards, but didn’t touch on the military side. There was an OSU military history graduate student in the class (as a student) who was tasked with (and did an admirable job of) teaching the military aspect of the class.
I recently had the opportunity to hear Juliana Fern Patten, author of “Another Side of World War II: A Coast Guard Lieutenant in the South Pacific” speak at a local Barnes & Noble. What I found so fascinating about her book is that 1) it is a collection of letters and photos from her father, a Coast Guard Lieutenant that he sent home to his mother during WWll, and 2) in her presentation, she did mention she is not a war historian, but while writing her book, she did have to read and research WWII history in order to accurately write her book.
Even though she is not a war historian, her book does depict the human side of war and I did learn a great deal about WWII from her book and presentation. I think this author is a perfect example of someone who never received the formal training in military history, but because she was dedicated to sharing her father’s story – the human side of war – her research and knowledge was readily passed on to her readers.
Thanks for starting this topic and for allowing me the opportunity to share my thoughts.
I know this is self-serving, but the folks following this conversation might be interested in a review I wrote of a book by a social historian covering military issues:
Thomas Bruscino, “Bringing Together Social Histories,” a review of Deborah Dash Moore, _GI Jews: How World War II Changed a Generation_, in Reviews in American History, 33 (December 2005).
Unfortunately it is not available for free online, but lots of campuses and institutions have online access to Reviews in American History.
Thanks for the cite–I do indeed have online access to RiAH and I’ll check it out!
This raises an interesting question. Several folks trained as social historians seem to have by choice and/or neccessity taught themselves enough military history to teach that aspect of for their courses. Can the reverse also apply? Can one trained mainly as a military historian pick up enough social/cultural history to do that aspect justice?
They sure can, but I kid you not, they then run the risk of being labeled (by other military historians) as not really being military historians. I heard that crap a few times after publishing The Hard Hand of War. I still hear it, even though I’ve published a significant amount of classical campaign and battle history.
Military historians can be every bit as stunningly bigoted as they accuse people in other fields of being.
BTW, I just returned from a visit to the University of Illinois, and two historians –Vernon Burton and Bruce Levine — spontaneously and on separate occasions said they would like to learn more military history. Burton is a social historian; Levine began his career as a labor historian. It just reinforces Rebecca’s point.
Absolutely concur with Mark on this. I have taught Australian military history for years, and make the point to classes every year that what people think happened in our military past, and how that shapes perceptions of war and the military in the here and now, is every bit as important as what *actually* may (or may not) have occurred. War occupies a very particular place in our national culture, and understanding why that is so makes all the difference, in my view, between really getting into the subject and simply being an anorak.
And I trained very much as an operational/strategic historian, and can still recite Napoleon’s marshals by name, take you up the hillside at Kapyong to discuss the rifle company positions and the Chinese offensive, trace developments in tactical doctrine in a given period, and so and so on. In my book, the two approaches are absolutely complementary.
I was trained as a military historian, but being influenced by the “war and society” angle (especially through being supervised by Frank Tallett) I found it easy enough to deal with social history. Now I’m trying to train myself to work on cultural history and critical theory, which is challenging but interesting. It remains to be seen how far I get, but I think blogging is a good opportunity to try out unfamiliar things.
This discussion just goes to show readers that history is and should be a big tent: there are many methodologies and approaches for us to learn about, and the more we know, the better off we are.
I’m not sure social historians look down on those of their number who attempt to learn about military history; that might have been true in the past, but no one has given me a hard time about it.
This was an excellent post, and you are to be congratulated for demonstrating that social and cultural history can blend seamlessly into traditional military history, to the benefit of both disciplines.
One of my colleagues, a Civil War historian, feels he’s created a certain amount of ill will by teaching the effects of the war as well as the military aspects.