Teaching Jacobitism for the Twenty-First Century

This is a case study in highlighting evolutionary changes that have taken place within the history profession in recent years. Between 2015 and 2021 I have taught and redesigned a course for university students on the Jacobites. During this time I have significantly evolved in my approach to teaching eighteenth century history. I have moved from designing knowledge-based courses to skill-based courses, skills which all historians use regardless of specialism or field of interest such as historical empathy, measuring progress and decline, close reading of primary and secondary sources. I introduced marginalised and often forgotten voices from history and in doing so disrupted the romantic image of the Jacobite.. With this approach aimed to promote a set of skills relevant for the twenty-first century. A new generation of students has a different approach to learning than previous generations and social media is now used to consolidate learning through interactivity and fun. The new media and the digital technologies are now essential tools whether it be online course design and assessment or face-to-face with the students. My traditional forms of teaching eighteenth century history have fundamentally been challenged by the new technologies and pedagogical approaches have undergone significant evolutionary change.

Diana Apcar’s Search for an Armenian Protectorate: Hope and Disappointment

This article studies Diana Agabeg Apcar’s (1859-1937) perspective regarding the proposed American mandate over genocide-ravaged Armenia. It touches on aspects of historical empathy that are important in assessing the true nature of historical events. Through examining Diana Apcar’s correspondence with different individuals such as David Starr Jordan, Thomas J. Edmonds, Charles Albert Gobat as well as her articles related to this topic, this article aims to reveal the attitudes, opinions and mindset of this Armenian historical figure regarding the mandate issue.

Developing Historical Competency: Teaching German History Through History Films At University Putra Malaysia (BA German Programme)

History films personalize, dramatize and emotionalize historical events and characters. They revive the past by exemplifying it in the present, engage ongoing discourses of history and as a result have proven to be the most influential medium in conveying history to large audiences. History films are regarded as an attractive, motivating and efficient (supplementary) teaching and learning medium in history as well as in foreign language classes. As part of the course “Historical Survey of Germany” (BA German-programme at University Putra Malaysia) history film projects on important periods and events in German history were conducted. The article introduces a film project on World War II and describes the pedagogical approach which aims to develop three core competencies of historical understanding – Content Knowledge, Historical Empathy/Perspective Recognition and Narrative Analysis. It discusses selected general findings provided as qualitative data in group and individual assignments. While the responses to questions related to Content Knowledge and Narrative Analysis show that students achieved higher competency levels, the participants showed shortcomings in the rational examination of historical characters, their perspectives and motivations for their actions. Time, practice and guidance can be identified as key factors in developing historical literacy competencies further.

THE GREAT “AUTO DE FE” AT SANTIAGO DE LOS CABALLEROS, OR HOW TO ACHIEVE HISTORICAL EMPATHY WITH CULTURAL HERITAGE THROUGH VIRTUAL REALITY

The project “The Great Auto de Fe in Santiago de los Caballeros” consisted of an interactive virtual recreation of this historical event that occurred on March 11, 1554 in the city today known as Antigua, Guatemala. A binational research team from Mexico and the U.S. made up of historians, architects and animation engineers, in the space of five weeks, created the historical settings, characters and interactivity necessary to offer the public this immersive experience. The project was presented within the framework of an international exhibition "The images of the Maya gods in the 16th century: The meeting of two worlds,” located at the Centro de Formación para la Cooperación Española in Antigua, the site of a former 17th century Jesuit College. This article presents the details of the workflow used, the social and cultural implications observed, as well as the results of the satisfaction surveys applied to approximately 80% of the users who had access to this experience.

Collecting affect: emotion and empathy in World War II photographs and drawings of plastic surgery

This article compares drawings by Diana ‘Dickie’ Orpen (1914–2008) with photographs by Percy Hennell (1911–1987); both of their oeuvres depict plastic reconstructive surgeries from World War II in Britain. Through visual analysis, personal experience and interviews with archivists who have worked with the collections, this article aims to determine the affective effects of these drawings and photographs. I argue that Hennell’s images are the more affective and subjective objects, even though their original purpose was objective and scientific. This article asks why Hennell’s photographs of plastic surgery produce such a vehement emotive response.Investigating Hennell’s use of colour, his compositional choices and the unexpected visual particulars of the operating theatre that he captures—all of which ‘collect affect’ within the photo-archival object—this analysis uses a phenomenological framework to determine the limitations and strengths of two very different styles and mediums of World War II surgical imagery.Beyond establishing which group of images is more affecting, this article also shows why it is empathy that is the most fitting emotional description of the typical responses to Hennell’s photographs. This type of visual analysis of empathic images can be applied to objects-based medical humanities pedagogy that encourages empathy—historical empathy as well as empathy in the present day—for surgical practitioners and trainees.

Advances in ethics education in the history classroom: after intersections of moral and historical consciousness

Using the history classroom as a context for ethics and moral education is a long, but also contested, tradition. Recently, more emphasis has been put on how to incorporate ethics education, with this paper exploring the spaces of ethics and moral education in the history classroom. It is argued here that insights from moral philosophy and theories of historical consciousness, but – importantly – also moral psychology and the study of moral emotions, are needed to realise the potential of history teaching and learning to support ethics education. Following this line, three spaces of ethics education in the history classroom are identified in this paper, including: reasoning about the moral quality of historical actors’ conduct; the use of historical empathy (perspective-taking); and reflection of the past’s moral meaning to the present and the future. As an example of how to implement this, a set of stimulus activities is presented that is designed for the classroom and a qualitative analysis of students’ responses that explicate expressions of students’ moral reasoning, perspective-taking, and historical consciousness.

Enseñar historia en tiempos de pandemia: un estudio de caso en una escuela chilena

The carried out research aims to identify and understand the main advantages and challenges for history and social sciences teaching in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, this study recognizes the work spaces that allow teachers to develop historical empathy and the teaching of participatory citizenship through this new school context. This is done through a case study of a group of teachers who belong to an educational centre in the Metropolitan Region of Chile; we have been able to collect the perceptions, emotions, feelings and views of history and social sciences teachers on how they develop their educational practice in a setting of pandemic. The methodology followed is of qualitative nature under a case study design. The results stand out concerning the interrelation that is generated. On the one hand, it interrelates in the complexity that teaching during the pandemic implies with the context of inequalities that the school faces highlighting the efforts of educational innovation to generate significant learning for and the students. Amongst the main conclusions there are the efforts made by teachers to generate educational innovation in the complex context of the pandemic, where the school and all the social problems that arise are inserted. Teachers have found the spaces and raised new perspectives of teaching that promote historical empathy and education for citizenship in students.