The depressing thing about studying history.
I’ve always been an observer. I sit around, often in public spaces, and listen to the all too intelligent banter between all knowing Americans more than most people should. I frequently find myself lurking comment sections, albeit lacking in comments myself, but nevertheless lurking to see what kind of thoughts are being processed aloud in the physical and digital realms of the American conversation. Needless to say, most people are not very aware of, well, frankly even the simplest of historic concepts. Yet, this is not just an American problem. It seems that a good portion of our world takes to the hobby of continuously repeating past mistakes.
As a person who studies history, this can be a rather frustrating thing to watch, but I know all to well what the problem really is: the way history is presented to the masses. I can’t speak for other countries, but I do know that in America, we learn history in a rather poor fashion. More than we would like to admit, history is taught by under qualified coaches who’s main concern is churning students through without much effort on their end so that they can get back to their real passion, the said sport of their choosing. I will say, however, that there are some exceptions to this rule, but nevertheless it is a prevalent problem in the secondary learning setting. I can only remember about two above average history teachers in all of my secondary education experience. This could also be said for my middle school years, when sports became more of a thing.
There is also the problem of the way the information is presented in textbooks and the overall dryness of the subject. The information recurrently feels extraneous and removed that students feel the information is expendable because it is so unconnected to anything they experience. My goal is to attempt to fix this all too familiar problem by seeking a different approach to presenting history to the masses. Wish me luck!