A Pedagogue's Progress |
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
History lectures I'm preparing my History lectures as I write this. They're coming along really...slowly. I've started work on the introductory lecture, which provides a broad overview of postcolonial Southeast Asian political history in accordance with the themes emphasised in the syllabus, but have decided to do more work on individual countries first before returning to it. Right now, the country I'm focusing on is Indonesia, whose post-independence history, particularly during the period 1956-1965, is far more complex than my initial, generalised readings (Tarling, Steinberg, SarDesai) suggested. What the readings, especially the biography of Sukarno by J. D. Legge that I'm pouring through, have driven home is the centrality of narrative in making sense of the past. There are no superior historiographical forms. Alas, my lectures will not be in narrative form, because the MOE wants us to focus on themes and the exams require comparative analysis of these themes across countries in the region. Narrative is too old-fashioned for the presentist, cutting-edge new syllabus. For the political history of postcolonial Southeast Asia, the themes are 1) different forms of government (democracy vs. authoritarianism), 2) the role of the military, and 3) the role of the Communist parties. Indonesia is the first country I am discussing because all three of them manifest themselves fully in its history from Sukarno to Suharto. Unfortunately, the themes overlap, particularly during the period of Guided Democracy, which saw Sukarno play an ultimately fatal balancing act between the resurgent Communists and the military. I cannot, intellectually and therefore pedagogically, separate them; only a narrative adequately captures the fluidity of the period. But if I persist with a narrative framework, my students will accuse me of not directly addressing the requirements of the syllabus. Some compromise between the two will be necessary, and finding that compromise has been my burden over the past few days. Which leads me to my next point: students. Or to be more specific -- since historians are always wary of over-generalising -- RJC History students in 2007. Whether or not they're more intelligent than my generation is irrelevant and ultimately unknowable. But they're certainly better off. I've sat in on their lectures and tutorials and seen their lecture notes, and still cannot believe how much better the teaching of History at RJC is these days. Students get proper lecture notes, for starters. Their assignments and exams come with actual post-mortems. Tutorials do more than just work out essay outlines. And the teachers certainly care much more about their students, as both their tutorials and the unbelievably detailed comments on students' essays suggest. I say all of this to underscore the enormity of the task that lies ahead. As much as I believe in teaching intellectual self-sufficiency -- something I partially learned while in JC -- it looks like I'll have to spoonfeed them more than I would like to, and perhaps more than the students deserve. Ultimately, it'll be good for me though, given my future career plans. I already feel that I know Indonesian history under Sukarno better than anything since Prester John three years ago. (By the way, I'd rather that this post, even if it is good enough, not be featured on the Intelligent Singaporean. Sooner or later students will find this blog of mine -- maybe they already have -- but until then, I'd rather it remain discreetly tucked away. If I do write something that I think the rest of the Singapore blogosphere should read, you can be sure that I'll say just that.) |
WHO AM I? Your author graduated from Dartmouth College in 2004 having majored in History and English. From June 2007, he will be teaching contemporary Southeast Asian history at another of his former schools. SOME WEBSITES I READ The Dartmouth Observer Singapore Websites The Intelligent Singaporean Mr Wang Says So Mr Brown Singabloodypore Singapore Angle Singapore Window A Xenoboy in Sg Gayle Goh Aaron Ng Molly Meek Elia Diodati Stressed Teacher Tym Blogs Too! Yawning Bread Talking Cock Non-Singapore Websites Andrew Sullivan The Belgravia Dispatch The American Scene Oxblog The Corner Bradford Plumer Matthew Yglesias The Washington Monthly National Review Online The Weekly Standard The Plank Open University Marty Peretz Michael Totten Martin Kramer Daniel Drezner Joe's Dartblog Instapundit Christopher Hitchens Ross Douthat IvyGate Les Belles Lettres Arts & Letters Daily The Atlantic Monthly History News Network Guardian Unlimited Books London Review of Books The New Criterion Voice of the Shuttle New York Review of Books ARCHIVES September 2006 October 2006 November 2006 December 2006 January 2007 February 2007 March 2007 April 2007 May 2007 June 2007 July 2007 August 2007 September 2007 October 2007 November 2007 December 2007 January 2008 February 2008 March 2008 April 2008 May 2008 June 2008 July 2008 August 2008 September 2008 October 2008 November 2008 December 2008 January 2009 February 2009 March 2009 April 2009 May 2009 June 2009 July 2009 November 2009 July 2010 October 2010 |