Table Of Content

DOCUMENT RESUME JC 990 108 ED 427 807 AUTHOR Doud, Robert E. Jim and Dave: A Dialogue. TITLE 1999-00-00 PUB DATE 8p.; "The ideas and opinions in this dialogue belong solely NOTE to the author and are in no way imputed to the real Jim and Dave." Opinion Papers (120) PUB TYPE MF01/PC01 Plus Postage. EDRS PRICE Aging in Academia; College Curriculum; *College Faculty; DESCRIPTORS *Community Colleges; *Educational History; Fiction; *History Instruction; *Humanities Instruction; *Teacher Retirement; Teacher Student Relationship; Tenure; Two Year Colleges *Pasadena City College CA IDENTIFIERS ABSTRACT This is a fictional dialogue intended to honor Jim Kingman and David Leary, both professors of history who retired after long careers at Pasadena City College in California (PCC). The dialogue hypothesizes the observations of both men as they look on the honorary gold plates of previous retirees that decorate the wall of a PCC public dining hall. The men discuss sentiments about having their own names added to the wall and philosophize about educational policy, institutions, traditions, the history department, teacher-student relationships, and community college education. The two marvel at the generations of students who will continue to pass through the halls of an institution where both men have contributed years of hard work. Of particular interest in the paper is a debate on the different approaches to teaching and studying history, and the role each has in ascertaining the truth about human nature. Jim is the voice of subjectivity, advocating the importance of art, poetry, literature, and individual perceptions in the college curriculum, while Dave takes a more disinterested approach, and is a bit more skeptical. Together they remember their colleagues, common experiences, and the many facets of scholarly life. (AS) ******************* ****** * ******** ********************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. ******************************************************************************** Jim and Dave: A Dialogue Robert E. Doud Pasadena City College U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE AND Office of Educational Research and Improvement DISSEMINATE THIS MATERIAL HAS EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION (ERie) BEEN GRANTED BY )4 ent has been reproduced as documCENTER This received from the person or organization R. Doud originating it. 0 Minor changes have been made to improve reproduction quality. RESOURCES TO THE EDUCATIONAL o Points of view or opinions stated in this INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) document do not necessarily represent official OERI position or policy. EST COPY MARLA ILE Jim and Dave : A Dialogue by Bob Doud retire after long Jim Kingman and David Leary are professors of history who are about to is a fictional dialogue written with the intent of careers at Pasadena City College. This this dialogue honoring them on their retirement from PCC. The ideas and opinions in Dave. belong solely to the author and are in no way imputed to the real Jim and ******************** gazing at the Jim: What a beautiful spring day this is, Dave. And here we are indoors, like two skinny golden plates on the red bricks of the Circadian Room at PCC. We sit reeds among our portly colleagues. by any of my Dave: Yes, I pride myself on never having been seen eating anything fact, this is the colleagues in all thirty-seven years of my tenure at PCC. As a matter of first time I've ever been in this dining area. chef, Jim: Well, Dave, it's the first time for me in the dining area as well. I am a gourmet ribbon and and save my appetite for when I cook by myself at home, wearing my medallion from the Cordon Bleu in Paris. little pleased by the Dave: I've heard that the reason you are so thin is that you are so things eaten by others of less refined taste. looking at these bricks which are Jim: Dave, you are correct, but now, tell me why you are covered with the names of retired comrades. here: to see the place Dave: Jim, I suspect you are here for the very same reason I am institution like PCC is liable to last an where our names will be next year, and forever! An exceedingly long time. made of real people, human beings Jim: But, Dave, history is not made of institutions. It is of real lives, agonizing and rejoicing of flesh and blood. It is made of the drama and poetry the feelings that flavor and together, consoling and congratulating each other, feeling season every life. sentimentalism of the moment. You know Dave: Jim, you are perhaps giving way to the translated from mere enthusiasm that what lasts is what has been planned, what has been procedures that will last over time into bricks and mortar, glass and steel, policies and history really is made of because they are reasonable. I hate to disagree, Jim, but institutions. and I have meant to PCC in a Jim: Dave, they will never be able to capture what you and department inscribed on it. single red brick bearing a small golden plate with our name is whatever that plate says. The Dave: Jim, all we will be to people in a few short years will be a few gossipy rumors, people who knew us will retire, and all that will be left of us really happened. These deeds will be distorted in a few,short tales of deeds that never told until the stories, retold ever less frequently, are never every retelling of our stories again. Nfiedema, former department chair of Social Jim: Look, Dave, there's the brick of Kennon he still lives in the neighborhood and is Sciences, for years an instructor of history. I hear in the Santa Anita area. writing the history of horse and jockey relations live in the area, but he is writing the history Dave: No, Jim, you have it wrong. Ken does preservation in the Pasadena area. of California bungalow construction and after Remember John? He moved far away soon Jim: And there's the brick of John Ellett. first hand the life along the Mississippi retirement, to Carthage, Missouri, to experience dozens of years. that he had so loved to teach about for would fine collection of farming tools he had. He Dave: Yes, I remember him, and the students who thought they were so primitive, bring those tools to class and show them to quaint, and difficult to use. of pioneer life by looking at those tools and Jim: No doubt students learned something actually.handling.them..: but Kaillf,eflema and,John Ellett were not only instructors in history, Daye.'It seemithit history. of'historithenielvas: YOn,ddift have to be well known to be part of are now,part :thatimOnments like these bricks are symbols pointing to pieces of age. Itbink ift4nielit,es.;can neVer,ftilli, preserve, muChlesi tell it to future hiStory Which their generations. ourselves. little to us until we are about to go away Dave: It's too bad these walls mean so contributed remembered, but that one wants to have It's not exactly that one wants to be something lasting. contributed inscription, there's no saying that you Jim: Even if you have a brick and an anything lasting. if we that a sense of tradition is valuable even Dave: Yet these bricks are here. It says contains. don't know the details of what the tradition is, and the the passing on of the truth, whatever that Jim: Tradition is all about continuity, generation. passing of what we know from generationAo think that,histoitiS a series'of discontinuities. Well-planned events Dave: Sometimes I else'.9finiptortiniee;:iiO4.quick decisions that set a pattern for the that never led to anything matter of shocks and adjustments, distant future flistory is bask:110f clite`O' don't you think? tradition anniversary, the jubilee of PCC? Is the PCC Jim: What about the Seventy,fifth people ar,ijUst,sp'airoadv eS, sock hops, and football games. worth very much at all? To most hi/iportantt,things that went What theyremeinber ordinary people remember and what is of Dave: Yeah, there's a difference between what day, instructors and students tried to historical importance. For all those years, day after classrooms. If you're a teacher, you get to say make something important happen in their the important about each topic, you know, within to your classes what you think is most that making a difference? context of the material being taught. Is It's only a symbol of all that happened. Jim: So, the jubilee is sort of like the bricks. of the teaching. Some, in spite of the People learned in different ways. Some, because teaching. outside the classroom. Don's knockplain old Dave: Some, inside the classroom. Some, tough times in life. good memories; they get us through some We taught and they learned. Jim: But these people learned something here. connection between teaching and learning really Dave: And we can't say exactly what the is. together of corroborated facts. It's what really Jim: History is in the details, the putting happened that makes history. broad sweeps; it's in the trends. Understanding Dave: I think rather that history is in the than the events themselves. the meaning of events is often more important the that chronology is what it's all about. Finding Jim: After all.these years, Dave, I know all about. actual sequenCe of events is what history is of certain events, figuring out what was Dave: I think it's more about the importance that's what history is about. really important and what was not things Things happen to them; they don't make Jim: People are mostly passive in history. happens to themselves have little to say about what happen. Events make people; people them. happen. The decisions of great persons Dave: Au contraire, Jim. Persons make events determine the course of world history. have their is about peoples, and peoples each Jim: It's as Herodotus said, Dave. History and nations and states are Different peoples have different characteristics, own uniqueness. history is to tell that are in them. The trick in writing what they are because of the people different events that happen. the story of the people beneath all the the goal definite laws that determine human progress; Dave: Not really so, Jim. There are life is going to to discover these laws. Human of history is, as Thucydides seemed to say, doom. empire rises and falls. We ride them to our follow these laws of history as each History the Roman historian Livy wrote it. Jim: No, Dave; good history is written as subjugated nature are, and then finding out what the values of each serves the empire by if you're a far as you can. That's the way to rule, respecting those values as much and as Roman emperor. 5 3 historian. The empire is always Dave: That's hardly the case. Tacitus was the better empire is the side that writes the history books. The correct, because the victorious You values on others. You go along or you don't survive. emperor forces his will and of vanquished peoples. can't make an empire by respecting the values and politics. It's the daily life of the Jim: You know, we've studied too much of wars important. people, family life and social structures, that's is set up, maintained, and exchanged Dave: Yes, but don't you think that the way power than the life of little people? between states and empires is more important and literature. That sort of thing. History Jim: What really tells about people is art, poetry, in human understanding. it's just the background, not the mthn event needs to be humble it contains the truth about History is important Dave: I think it's the other way around. these literature art, poetry, music, the rest of human nature. The things you mention history along the way. things are only examples of things produced by History of history to tell us how to be human? Jim: Don't you think, Dave, that it's the job disciplines principle, or set of principles, behind the is best understood as an organizing called the Humanities. best is more like the Sciences than anything Dave: We disagree again, Jim. History at its truth; overstressing the feelings, values, and else. It is a disinterested way of ascertaining become a distraction from finding out emotional expressions of people in every age can what really happened. happening. felt when what was happening was Jim: What really happened is what people of events superior in importance to Post-modernism tells us that it is futile to make one set pseudo-boundaries and artificial differences another set of events. It also breaks down the history and psychology, sociology and between such realities as art and entertainment, political science. before, methods? Anything goes? We've seen that Dave: You mean there are no rules? No aesthetics Graham Sumner, or in the political Jim, as in the cultural relativism of William It in the perspectivism of Friedrich Nietzsche. of the Frankfurt School, or for that matter indeed! post-modernism has been with us a very long time seems to me that and of teacher and student, or of oppressor Jim: What about the current role reversal of I've seen exciting changes in the teaching oppressed? Since I've been teaching, Dave, from the point of view of oppressed people history. For instance, we try to teach now victorious oppressors. rather than the point of view of the Still, I and it's a refreshing change for some of us. Dave: Well, that is in fashion right now, what happened, rather than to give a voice to think a good history class is to find out oppressed minorities. detached from the plights of real people, often ones Tim: Facts are meaningless if they are who were disadvantaged or exploited. 6 4 whether or not the facts fit their own Dave: But students need to know what happened, which do not help our own arguments point of view. The respect for facts, especially ones this is what education is all about. and points of view positions, and voicing perspectives not based Jim: Venting feelings, repeating entrenched the educational historical perspective are really disservices to on fact or not placed in process. need education of the heart and Dave: But feelings and facts go together and we mind. sensibilities as well as education of the thinking students for citizenship? History has a Jim: Isn't it our role in a democracy to prepare members, jurors, future politicians . . special role in making good voters, community . important to prepare them for individual success or Dave: I don't know whether it is more for participation in civic life. and presented in ways that are relevant to them Jim: Students can't learn unless history is to their ethnic groups. ethnic and balkanized into the stories of various Dave: But history cannot be morselized not? history that is common to all people, is there groups, can it? There is a science. and pedagogy is as important *as historical Jim: In college, students are still young entertainment and motivation in the classroom. The imMafure student.especially, needs is always more important than teaching Dave: I think:that hiStorical methodology discipline is something we shouldn't have to worry methods. Worrying about classroom still have a place in the classroom about in college. Sitting still and taking notes speak, right relate to students where they are, so to Jim: We need to make our teaching now. for them for upper division courses and Dave: I rather think that we need to prepare universities. history as it is taught and learned in important than the the way history is learned is more Jim: At our community college level, she should be an active The student is the focus of our concern; he or way it is taught. often a of one another. The way we teach is learner. Students are the best teachers hindrance to the learning process. quickest way to education has taken you in, Jim. The Dave: The new jargon in higher show well-prepared teacher in a classroom. The way to effective learning is to have a thrown to them exposed to well-prepared teachers, not respect for students is to have ill-prepared students. founder in discussions with other passively in difference. We are not training people to sit Jim: Technology is making a the interact with vast resources of information over classrooms. We are training them to information any don't depend on the teacher for their Internet and World Wide Web. They more, Dave 7 5 they're not going to read what comes over Dave: Look, Jim, if they don't read a textbook, They wont be able to tell the good stuff the Internet. Have a little common sense, Jim. know a good deal about the topic. They need from electronic garbage unless they already guidance, Jim, and the teachers are the guides. Jim. Concedo. Nollo contendere. cutting The librarians around here are on the Dave: But don't give up your point too soon. changeover from the dominance of the print edge of change. They have already felt the medium. medium to the dominance of the electronic imagination, not educational jargon or even new Jim: What's needed most in education is technologies. against "inert ideas." "Inert ideas" were ideas Dave: Oh yeah, remember Whitehead was the without pizzaz, without vigor. Imagination is that had been taught for a long time, but deadly of ideas which are old and new. ffistory is constant combination and recombination if not taught with imagination. Jim: What is imagination? mental faculty. It's a combination of mental Dave: Can't say exactly. It's not a single adventure of and excitement. Whitehead.calls it "the processes, mixed with emotion like Mark and Hugo. ideas." You can see it in younger teachers might have better spent your career at a four- Jim: Wow! Dave, I often thought that you would have done college with a select student body. Perhaps you year school, a liberal arts students more stimulating. more writing and found the yourself have whatever jobs we do have. You Dave: Jim, we academics are all fortunate to graduate students at a major university. Day would do well presenting the Civil War to though the immerse ourselves in our subjects, even after day, here at PCC, we are able to grind at times. mechanics of basic-level teaching is admittedly a long theses and dissertations Jim: and we don't have to read and direct in the writing and revising Dave: which go on for months and years colleagues that are sometimes ugly and caustic Jim: with disagreements among contrived or hardly relevant at all! Dave: on topics that are precious, have done well in having found a Jim: Without being smug, I can say that we two and definitely a service to others. scholarly life that is moderately well-paid would overwhelmed here with attention and adulation, we Dave: Even though one is not have to say it feels worthwhile. feel the sense of worthwhileness of which we Jim: Too bad the bricks in the wall do not speak. of all that we have spoken of as worthwhile. Dave: Too bad the bricks cannot speak 8 6 Reproduction Release I 6:-NIT U.S. Department of Education E IC Office of Educational Research and Improvement PERI) National Libraiy of Education (NLE) Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC) 0-6qew los Reproduction Release (Specific Document) I. DOCUMENT IDENTIFICATION: Title: A ck,A1-06-vc t k AN() pt 1E ki F. D 0 Author(s): Publication Date: Corporate Source: VAsAvetvA cat cow_ec-c. APR1/41.- 1) Oict°1 "?*? U'OONAPLEASE: community, in orderto disseminate asidcly 4:;;Ixig:sible timelY and significant materials of interest to the educational usually made doCUMOt?roieUuced in;tbenionthl*,abstriet journal of the ERIC system, Resources in Education (R1E), are the ERIC Document uyuilUble tO;;Uieit;iiinideiOfielte, reiitodUped:Outier copy, and electronic media, and sold through granted, one RePiodiietiehSei0Oe'.(1tD0). Credit is'gfren to the source of each document, and, if reproduction release is of the f011OWing notiCes is affiXed to the document. document, please CHECK ONE of the following three If permission is granted to reproduce and disseminate the identified options and sign in the indicated space following. 4 3/31/99 9:57 AM 1 of 3 Reproduction Release The sample sticker shown below will be affixed to al The sample sticker shown below will be affixed to all The sample sticker shown below will be Level 28 documents Level 2A docummts affixed to all Level 1 documents PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE AND DISSEMINATE THIS MATERIAL IN PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE AND MICROFICHE, AND TN ELECTRONIC MEDIA PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE AND DISSEMINATE THIS MATERIAL IN FOR ERIC COLLECTION SUBSCRIBERS ONLY, DISSEMINATE THIS MATERIAL HAS 1 GRANTED 111 MICROFICHE ONLY HAS B BY HAS BEEN GRA BY BEEN 0 TO THE EDU ATIONAL RESOURCES TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) Level 2B Level 2A Level 1 I t / Check here for Level 1 mlease, permng ,,,, check here for Level 2A release, permitting reproduction Check here for Level 28 release, permitting and dissemination in microfiche and in electronic media reProduction and diasenlinatinn in iniera''''n reproduction and dissemination in microfiche only or other ERIC arthival media (eg electronic) for ERIC archival collection subscribers only and paper copy. Documents will be processed as indicated provided reproduction quality permits. processed at Level 1. If permission to reproduce is granted, but no box is checked, documents will be Center (ERIC) nonexclusNe permisiion to reproduce and I herebygiahi to,theEducallimal Resourcel Information microfiche, or electronic media by persons disseminate this daCUmenias.indicated above. Reproduction from the ERIC perinission from. the copyright holder Exception is made other thahlEleCeinplOie.i and its system contractors requires sails& information needs of educators in response for non-Prafit.rePradOionrby libraries and other service agencies to to cffscrele inquiries:' Printed Name/Position/Title: Signature: ko gEfer t. P7PRoC.C-Cog- Do u Ci\A4-12-A-k- `PcA i Fax: elephone: Organization/Address: tuf G M9 -SYs---71 9 ki,A-A0 ZniA-O Date: E-mail Address: R000 0 a kis PACC D,CC , C A . 4 (FROM NON-ERIC SOURCE): III. DOCUMENT AVALLABMITY INFORMATION ERIC to cite the availability of the document from another If permission to reproduce is not granted to ERIC, or, if you wish will not announce a information regarding the availability of the document. (ERIC source, please provide the following be specified. Contributors should also be aware that document unless it is publicly available, and a dependable source can documents that cannot be made available through EDRS.) ERIC selection criteria are significantly more stringent for 3/31/99 9:57 AM 2 Of 3