HON 3213 Harvey J. Graff
Fall, 1998
Growing Up in America: Past, Present, Future
Did childhood exist in the past, or is it a modern invention? Are childhood (and children) and adolescence (and adolescents), as we have known them, and as some claim, disappearing? Are they biological or "natural" and universal stages of human development, or at least in part the products of society and culture and history? Do childhood and children have a future? How different from today was growing up in the past? How did the young mature in past times, and what relationships to current patterns does that past have?
This course asks a number of important questions about the changing experiences and meanings of growing up--childhood, adolescence, youth, "coming of age." In contrast to most contemporary views, it looks seriously at the past, at the history of growing up, as a comparison to the present and as the specific context from which today's patterns and problems developed. History thus provides a rich laboratory in which current notions about growing up--for example, from psychology, anthropology, sociology, human developmental studies, and related areas--may be explored and tested. The relevance, usefulness, and accuracy of theories that relate to growing up will be examined in historical context and probed over a broad expanse of time.
A wide variety of evidence, including films and novels and memoirs, and a number of different research traditions and approaches are considered. In addition, we will evaluate family, child, and youth policy as it has developed over time, and its functions today, and as it provides options for tomorrow. A new, broad, rich, and interdisciplinary understanding of growing up and its challenges is the course goal.
Requirements:
1. Regular attendance, preparation, and participation
2. 3 1-2-page "reaction\evaluation" papers at regular intervals during the semester, each 3-4 weeks, responding to required reading, films, etc. Due: first week in September, October, and November
3. Participation in a group research project and brief class oral presentation: giving historical, theoretical, and policy context and perspective to a contemporary question or problem; presentations during final 3-4 weeks of course
4. 10-page paper: using course ideas and materials to interpret primary sources on growing up, selected from either materials on students' own families (with source materials including at least 2-3 generations), or from Eve Merriam, ed., Growing Up Female in America: Ten Lives; Chris Mayfield, ed., Growing Up Southern; Hamilton Holt, ed., The Life Stories of Undistinguished Americans as Told by Themselves; Mary Frosch, ed., Coming of Age in America; or Harold Augenbraum and Ilan Stavans, eds., Growing Up Latino (detailed information provided in class). Due at final class meeting
Books ordered for University Bookstore (all paperbound):
Note when there is a choice of books
Harvey J. Graff, ed., Growing Up in America: Historical Experiences.
Wayne State University Press, 1987
J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye. [1951]
Sandra Cisneros, The House on Mango Street. Vintage, 1991 [1984]
W. Norton Grubb and Marvin Lazerson, Broken Promises: How Americans Fail
Their Children. Univ. of Chicago Press, 1988 [1982]
Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life. . . an American Slave. New American
Library, 1968 [1845] OR
Lucy Larcom, A New England Girlhood. Northeastern U.P., 1986 [1889]
Edward Eggleston, The Hoosier Schoolmaster. Indiana U.P., 1984 [1871] OR
Stephen Crane, Maggie, A Girl of the Streets. Fawcett, 1960 [1893]
Anzia Yezierska, The Bread Givers. Persea, 1975 [1925] OR
Kate Simon, Bronx Primitive. Harper and Row, 1982
Richard Wright, Black Boy. Perennial Classic, 1966 [1937] OR
E.L. Doctorow, World's Fair. Random House, 1985
Optional, for essays (choose one):
Eve Merriam, ed., Growing Up in Female in America: Ten Lives. Beacon, 1987
[1971]
Chris Mayfield, ed., Growing Up Southern: Southern Exposure Looks at Childhood
Then and Now. Pantheon, 1981 [This book is out of print; copies are
available at used book stores]
Hamilton Holt, ed., The Life Stories of Undistinguished Americans as Told by
Themselves, ed. Werner Sollers. Routledge, 1990 [1906]
Mary Frosch, ed., Coming of Age in America: A Multicultural Anthology. New
Press, 1994
Harold Augenbraum and and Ilan Stavans, eds., Growing Up Latino: Memoirs and
Stories. Houghton Mifflin, 1993
Optional, recommended but not required:
Harvey J. Graff, Conflicting Paths: Growing Up in America (Harvard U.P., 1995)
Harvey J. Graff
Fall, 1998
Growing Up in America: Past, Present, Future
Syllabus
Week 1. (8/24) Introduction: Questions, Issues, Approaches
Reading: Graff, ed., Growing Up in America [GUA], Part I
readings, 1-4
Film: "Lord of the Flies" (90)
Week 2. (8/31) European Traditions, American Origins: Early Paths of Growing Up
Reading: Keith Thomas, "Children in Early Modern England,"
in Children and their Books, ed. Gillian Avery and Julia
Briggs (Oxford Univ. Press, 1989), 45-77 [Library reserve]
Film: "The Return of Martin Guerre" (111)
Week 3. (9/14) Seventeenth-Century Beginnings of Growing Up in America: Change
and Continuity, Variations on Themes
Reading: GUA, 5, 6, 7
Week 4. (9/21) Eighteenth-Century Transitions: Rebellions Over the Land
Reading: GUA, 8,9,10
Film: "The Wild Child" (85)
Week 5. (9/28) Diversity and Early Transformations: Commercialization, Migration,
Urbanization. Family Change and Growing Up Change, c. 1780s-1840s
Reading: GUA, 11, 12, 13; and choose from:
Frederick Douglass, Autobiography or
Lucy Larcom, A New England Girlhood
Films from the American Social History Project:
"Daughters of Free Men," "The Five Points," "Doing All
They Can" (75)
Week 6. (10/5) Early Modernity: Remaking Growing Up in Nineteenth-Century America
Reading: GUA, 14, 15, 16, 17;
Douglass and/or Larcom
Film: "The Molders of Troy" (90)
Week 7. (10/12) Slouching toward the Modern Ways: Contradictions and Irregu
larity in the Transformations toward Modern Paths of Growing Up.
Race, Sex/Gender, Social Class, Ethnicity, Geography
Reading:
Edward Eggleston, The Hoosier Schoolmaster OR
Stephen Crane, Maggie, Girl of the Streets
Slides from Canada's Visual Past series
Week 8. (10/19) Change and Continuity: The Incomplete Revolution Among the
Young. Policy, Institutions, the State, and the Family
Reading: GUA, 18-24 [for two weeks]
Week 9. (10/26) Turning the Century: A Progressive Synthesis? Reforming the
Young (Again?)
Reading: GUA, 18-24 [for two weeks]
Anzia Yezierska, The Bread Givers OR
Kate Simon, Bronx Primitive
Film: "My Brilliant Career" (101)
Week 10. (11/2) Twentieth-Century Transitions I c. 1900s-1940s
Reading: GUA, 25-31 [for next two weeks] and choose:
Richard Wright, Black Boy OR
E.L. Doctorow, World's Fair
Film: "Rebel Without a Cause" (111)
Week 11. (11/9) Twentieth-Century Transitions II c. 1940s-1960s
Reading: GUA, 25-31 [two weeks]
J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
Film: "High School" (75)
Week 12. (11/16) Boom! Boom! Baby Boomers! Radical Youth, Conformist Youth
Film: "Street Wise" (92)
Reading: Sandra Cisneros, The House on Mango Street
Optional: Vicki Ruiz, "'Star Struck': Acculturation, Adoles
cence, and the Mexican American Woman, 1920-1950," in
Building With Our Own Hands: New Directions in Chicana
Studies, ed. Adela de la Torre and Beatriz M. Pesquera
(University of California Press, 1993), 109-129, and
"Oral History and La Mujer: The Rosa Gerrero Story,"
in Women on the U.S.-Mexico Border: Responses to
Change, ed. Ruiz and Susan Tiano (Allen & Unwin,
1987), 219-231 [Library Reserve]
Week 13. (11/23) All Fall Down? The Rise and Fall of the Cult of Childhood
and Adolescence
Reading: GUA, 31-33
Week 14. (11/30) (Today?/Tomorrow? Is There a Future for Growing Up in the
Age of "the childlike adult and the adultlike child"? Yesterday,
Today, Tomorrow
Reading: W. Norton Grubb and Marvin Lazerson, Broken Prom
ises: How Americans Fail Their Children, esp. Part I
Optional: Andrew J. Cherlin, ed., The Changing American
Family and Public Policy (Urban Institute, 1988
[Library reserve]
Film: "Heathers" (102)
FINAL ESSAYS DUE AT CLASS TIME
Harvey J. Graff
HON 3213
Monday, 2:00-4:45 pm
Growing Up in America: Past, Present, Future
Fall, 1998
Description of Course
Did childhood exist in the past, or is it a modern invention? Are childhood and adolescence, as we have known them, and as some claim, disappearing? Are they biological or "natural" and universal stages of human development, or at least in part the products of society and culture and history? Do childhood and children have a future? How different from today was growing up in the past? How did the young mature in past times, and what relationships to current patterns does that past have?
This course asks a number of important questions about the changing experiences and meanings of growing up--childhood, adolescence, youth, "coming of age." In contrast to most contemporary views, it looks seriously at the past, at the history of growing up, as a comparison to the present and as the specific context from which today's patterns and problems developed. History thus provides a rich laboratory in which current notions about growing up--for example, from psychology, anthropology, sociology, human developmental studies, and related areas--may be explored and tested. The relevance, usefulness, and accuracy of theories that relate to growing up will be examined in historical context and probed over a broad expanse of time.
A wide variety of evidence, including films and novels, and a number of different research traditions and approaches are considered. In addition, we will evaluate family, child, and youth policy as it has developed over time, and its functions today, and as it provides options for tomorrow. A new, broad, rich, and interdisciplinary understanding of growing up and its challenges is the course goal.
Requirements: 1. Regular attendance, preparation, and participation; 2. 3 2-page "reaction\evaluation" papers at regular intervals during the semester, each 3-4 weeks, responding to required reading, films, etc. Due: first week in September, October, and November. 3. Participation in a group research project and class presentation: giving historical, theoretical, and policy context and perspective to a contemporary question or problem; 4. 10 page paper: synthesis and integration of course ideas and materials with primary sources on growing up, selected from either materials of students' own research or from Eve Merriam, ed., Growing Up Female in America: Ten Lives, Chris Mayfield, ed., Growing Up Southern, Hamilton Holt, ed., Life Stories; Mary Frosch, ed., Coming of Age in America; Harold Augenbraum and Ilan Stavans, eds., Growing Up Latino (detailed information provided in class).
Books ordered for University Bookstore and Off-Campus Books include: Harvey J. Graff, ed., Growing Up in America: Historical Experiences; Edward Eggleston, The Hoosier Schoolmaster; Stephen Crane, Maggie, A Girl of the Streets; Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life. . . an American Slave; Lucy Larcom, A New England Girlhood; Richard Wright, Black Boy; J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye; Sandra Cisneros, The House on Mango Street; W. Norton Grubb and Marvin Lazerson, Broken Promises: How Americans Fail Their Children.
HON 3213 Harvey J. Graff
Growing Up in America: Past, Present, Future
Assignments
As noted in the syllabus, in addition to preparation and participation in class sessions, there are three other formal course requirements: "reactions/evaluation" papers (3); group research-oral reports; and an essay. This hand-out provides initial information on them.
"Reaction/Evaluation" papers: Due at the first class session of each month of the semester (Sept. 14, Oct. 5, Nov. 2) are brief commentaries--more or less, informed conversations--of no more than 1-2 pages (double-spaced, typewritten--simply staple pages, no covers or cover sheets). Each paper should focus on one topic and one or more readings or films from one week among the 3 to 4 weeks of the course preceding the due date for each of the three required papers. Present, clearly and to the point, your intellectual response to the topic and the reading and/or visual material related to it for the week you have chosen. You may offer constructive criticism, further ideas or reflections, questions, connections to other aspects of the course or other courses or your own experience. Do not make this task more difficult than it needs to be--it should not occupy a great deal of your time. Keeping up with reading and class work make this kind of writing much easier!
Group research/oral reports*: On or about the third week of the semester, we will form--following your own choices--groups of 3 or 4 members. All groups will focus on one of the many significant aspects of growing up--childhood, adolescence, youth--that attract attention today. These may range from day-care, latch-key children, child and family abuse, to teen suicide, adolescent pregnancy, one-parent families and single mothers, gifted youth, etc. There is no limit to the topics. In accordance with your own interests, you will join a group whose purpose is to research the topic historically, that is, to provide necessary perspectives on today's discussions through longer-term views, comparisons, background, alternative formulations or viewpoints, etc. Each group will ask: what difference(s) does a historical perspective make? A moderate (but not excessive) amount of library research is expected; the instructor will provide bibliographic and other advice and some class time will be allocated for group work. During the final 3-4 weeks of the semester, each group will report orally (approx. 20 minutes) the results of its research and respond to questions from the class. A bibliography of sources, due at the time of the report, is the only written part of the assignment. [*the number and size of the groups depend in part on the size of the class.]
Essays: due at the end of the semester--at the time of last class session: Nov. 30--are essays of approx. 10 pages (double-spaced, typewritten, simply stapled--no covers or coversheets; with footnotes and bibliography as needed [prepared according to the style of your major]; written in non-sexist, gender neutral language). Papers may take one of two forms. Using one of the three collections of life histories available in the bookstore (Growing Up Female; Growing Up Southern; The Life Stories of Undistinguished Americans; Coming of Age in America; Growing Up Latino), as your research material, you may write an essay on those aspects of the history of growing up that these first-person sources open to your reading, questions, and investigation. These may take the form of comparisons across time and space; change and/or continuity over time; comparisons across persons growing up at more or less than same historical moment, among a wide range of possible topics, issues, and questions. That choice is yours to make. You are expected to use the ideas, concepts, interpretations, approaches, methods, materials, etc., offered in the course (from readings, films, discussion, lectures) in making your own approach to and in discussing and interpreting the primary sources collected in each of the three anthologies. Without them, your task would be much more difficult.
The second option is writing a history of growing up in your own family history. This will need the approval of the instructor. Such a project depends on the availability of research materials for your use (including oral history/interview material that you collect yourself) at least a part of which are written and saved. It also requires information on at least two or three generations ending with your own (if you wish). As with the other option, choice of topics, issues, questions, etc., is yours and you are expected to use course materials and ideas in developing the project.
Note: 1)plagiarism results in failure; 2)staple papers in the upper-left corner before turning them in. No folders or covers, no fancy cover sheets. Indicate on the top of the first page your name and section; 3)please use non-sexist, gender-neutral language (in discussions and reports, too); 4)if your are using a dot-matrix printer, be sure the ribbon is relatively new and the print-out is legible; otherwise paper will not be read or evaluated; 5)should you require special assistance, in addition to the instructor (and teaching assistant), there is the university's writing lab and many reference and guide materials; 6)if you wish your paper to be returned at the end of the semester, please provide a stamped, self-addressed envelope when you turn in your final essay.
Good Luck!!!
HON 3213 Harvey J. Graff
Growing Up in America: Past, Present, Future
Group Oral Reports
Goal and Focus: To ask and begin to answer "the question of history." Through the use of library research (and course materials if relevant), each group of 3-4 students will ask: how does our view and understanding of the topic we have selected (say, teenage pregnancy, high schools, single parents) change when we examine it with the perspective of history? Does a longer time span change the way we see matters? Are today's issues long-standing ones or new concerns? What alternative views are possible? and related questions. Various possible answers to such questions can be developed through a careful but not overly-long search in library sources. We are not seeking either complete or final responses but rather tentative ones and "working" ideas.
The groups: During the third week of the semester, class members will generate a list of possible topics and then form groups (3-4 students per group) to work on them.
Each group will:
--develop a plan to research and bring together the results of that research in the form of a 20 minute oral report to the class (or a part of the class);
--central to the plan is defining, focussing, and narrowing the topic into a manageable issue or set of issues, and dividing the labor of group members for its study. For most topics, groups will need to be selective, and not attempt to cover their subjects in either too much breadth or breadth. Group efforts should aim to strike a balance;
--the instructor will provide "starter" historical references for all groups, and both the instructor and the teaching assistant will be available for consultation and advice as requested;
--when possible, class time will be allocated for project work;
--group planning will aim at defining the general topic and then dividing it into a selection of major elements or subtopics that individual members can research in the UTSA or other libraries, and then integrate the results of that research into a coherent oral presentation;
--groups should consult reference librarians for help in identifying appropriate and useful historical and contemporary source materials
--a wide range of research materials is available, although specific sources will vary from topic to topic and focus to focus. Among the usual kinds of materials that prove helpful are: government reports, often with a numerical basis; articles in academic journals and periodicals; reports in major newspapers and magazines; book-length studies including case studies of specific places, times, or groups; anthologies or collections of studies on a specific topic; reports of various social service and volunteer groups. Some groups have interviewed persons engaged in relevant activities and professional experts in the San Antonio metropolitan area. There are many other possible sources too. Use the on-line catalogue of UTSA and San Antonio-area library holdings, and search there and in relevant indexes and databases for your topic and its related elements. Ask reference librarian to help you find relevant guides, indexes, and databases;
--keep in mind that your goal is to locate and sample a range of relevant information and points of views that helps you to survey selectively your topic and allows the kind of interim or tentative findings and conclusions suitable for a brief, 15 minute presentation to the class. No complete, exhaustive, or final conclusions are expected, or are even possible. Brief reports that focus relatively closely and clearly on major issues are the target.
Groups needing copies of handouts to be duplicated and/or audio/visual equipment for their presentations should coordinate with the instructor (or teaching assistant) 1-2 weeks in advance of the time for their presentation
At the time of presentation, each group will turn in one copy of:
--their plan of work;
--a bibliography of the reference sources (primary and secondary) that they have consulted (length by itself is no virtue);
--a log that outlines each member's work on the project: tasks done and time spent on them--what was accomplished, when and where work done, etc. (no more than 1-2 pages);
--a general outline of the oral presentation (1 page);
--an anecdotal evaluation of the group's work with a recommendation for the group's grade for the overall project. This statement of no more than 2 pages should address problems that arose and the steps taken to solve them as well as problems that remained unsolved. It should be serious and constructively critical, asking, for example, what alternative plans or steps might have been taken, how as a result of this effort might a new plan differ from the first, what steps worked well and what steps did not (and why), etc.
Evaluation: the peer, self-evaluation of each group will make up about 40% of the group's grade for this assignment (oral reports make up 20-25% of overall course grades). It is very important that the anecdotal evaluation (supplemented by the plan of work, bibliography, and log) and the recommended grade support each other (especially since I don't expect many groups to recommend low grades for themselves). Except in very exceptional situations, all members of each group will get the same grade for the project
Evaluation--by both each group and the instructor--is based on:
--the quality of the plan of work and its degree of success in meeting the overall assignment;
--that success includes the defining and narrowing of the topic, the dividing of labor, the quality (not just the length) of the bibliography, the conduct of research, and the results of that definition and research as presented in the form of an oral report;
--the development of the oral presentation to select, integrate and interrelate, and synthesize the research;
--the presentation itself (as evaluated by instructor and teaching assistant)
Good Luck!!!