As we have seen from tonight's lecture, concepts build on each other. Some survive through the centuries, The Five Cannons of Rhetoric for example, have been handed down from the Ancients and continue to form the basis of contemporary persuasion. Those devices set out for us were recorded and passed through countless generations because they are as effective today as they were for the humanity that preceded us. As mysterious as these great minds remain to me personally, I am comforted by their legacy. That is the connection that links me to a people I can only fathom through what they have taught me about their thought process.
The essay, "from Archives of Instruction: Nineteenth-Century Rhetorics, Reders, and Composition Books in the United States" makes a similar connection; that within those textbooks is very little that is original. Indeed, the ancient past resides in their compilations. Carr and Schultz present a strong case that a textbook is a storehouse of ideas passed through a generational transmission intended to influence future behavior.
If I wasn't doing a creative thesis, I would seriously consider doing research on textbooks as encapsulations of humanity. What marvelous confessions they would offer of cultural and social propaganda from the past. That geneaological sifting would trace and uncover our pedagogy through time, confirming our rhetorical roots.
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ReplyDeleteI, too, was intrigued by the discussions of textbooks in our readings. Textbooks certainly can be instruments of propaganda. If they weren't, there wouldn't be such huge controversies over what is included or not included: evolution, ethnic minorities, etc. It seems that by controlling the content of textbooks, you indirectly control the development of thought and what is perceived as "truth." Just as you say above, they are a "generational transmission intended to influence future behavior." Textbooks always have an inherent credibility, so that no one questions the quality of information included. As I consider the textbooks, in my K-12 schooling, there was very little representation of women and minorities. This created a "truth" that some people were worth learning about and everyone else just qualified as "other." What a power textbooks have!
ReplyDeleteYou're right, Dawn. They are powerful because the certainly do influence thinking and reflect changes in thinking. I was a parent representative on a curriculum committee in Sacramento and what an eye-opener that was as the community jockeyed for their "agenda" to be represented and other "agendas" to be negated based on textbook selection. What powerful propaganda textbooks can export. The shaping of young minds and perpetuating myths are contained in these pages. What a vehicle for "spinning a culture".
ReplyDeleteTextbooks probably do hold lots of history and points of view that amount to propaganda. But I think textbooks can be keys to many ideas and implant curiosity to explore them further. Or they can limit the student by presenting the information as correct, or all inclusive, when perhaps there is room for error or further exploration. In the Education Department course that I took on reading last year, they stressed strongly that good teachers reached beyond the text to bring in other literature, graphic novels, electronic novels, etc. The same I am sure could be said for composition issues. But a text holds a place and helps a teacher in organizing their lessons and presenting a comprehensive picture. Personally I feel every effort should be made to improve texts, rather than abandon them.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comments, Linda, from a personal experience. The essays we have been reading also encourage going beyond the text book. Today there are mediums that weren't available to my classrooms of the 60's and 70's. Students were thrilled if a 16mm film was shown on a projector.
ReplyDeleteI still have my freshman comp. textbook from my college days when this institution was Southern Colorado State College. I purposely kept it as a reference when I became an English teacher. When I taught in northern Colorado I brought a southern Colorado influence with me.