Abstract
In this paper I explore the connection between narrative ethics and the increasing emphasis on historical consciousness as a way to cultivate moral responsibility in history education. I use Timothy Findley’s World War I novel, The Wars, as an example of how teachers might help students to see history neither simply as a collection of artefacts from the past, nor as an effort to construct an objective view about what went on in those other times and places, but rather as something that makes ethical demands on us here and now. Theoretically, this paper draws on Adam Zachary Newton’s conception of narrative ethics and Roger Simon’s conception of historical consciousness, both of which rest on the Levinasian themes of irreducible difference, the face, and subjectivity as a position of ethical responsibility to and for the other.
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
Claudia Eppert’s chapter on Joy Kogawa’s novel Obasan (in Simon et al. 2000) makes an argument similar to what I am proposing here.
References
Bauman, Z. (1993). Postmodern ethics. Oxford: Blackwell.
Bennington, G. (2000). Interrupting Derrida. New York: Routledge.
Biesta, G. (2004). The community of those who have nothing in common: Education and the language of responsibility. Interchange, 35(3), 307–324.
Boyd, C. [n.d.] Canadian Encyclopedia entry on The Wars http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/index.cfm?PgNm=TCE&Params=A1ARTA0011652.
Brudney, D. (1990). Knowledge and silence: The Golden Bowl and moral philosophy. Critical Inquiry, 16, 397–437.
Bryant, D., & Clark, P. (2006). Historical empathy and Canada: A People’s History. Canadian Journal of Education, 29(4), 1039–1063.
Cabanes, B. (2007). The Great War, grief, and memory. Open Yale courses. Lecture 16: Transcript. October 31, 2007. http://oyc.yale.edu/history/france-since-1871/content/transcripts/transcript-16-the-great-war-grief-and-memory-bruno.
Chinnery, A. (2009). Premodern postures for a postmodern ethics: On resistant texts and moral education. In R. Glass (Ed.), Philosophy of education 2008 (pp. 43–50). Urbana-Champaign, IL: Philosophy of Education Society.
Derrida, J. (1994). Specters of Marx: The state of the debt, the work of mourning, and the New International. (trans. P. Kamuf) New York: Routledge.
Derrida, J. (1996). Archive fever: A freudian impression. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Derrida, J. 1997. Politics of Friendship. (trans. G. Collins) New York: Verso, 1997.
Felman, S., & Laub, D. (1992). Testimony: Crises of witnessing in literature, psychoanalysis, and history. New York: Routledge.
Findley, T. (1977). The wars. Toronto: Clarke Irwin.
Levinas, E. (1987). Time and the other [and additional essays]. ed., R.A. Cohen. Pittsburgh, PA: Duquesne University Press.
Levisohn, J. A. (2003). Stories about stories about history: Hayden White, historiography, and history education. In S. Fletcher (Ed.), Philosophy of Education 2002 (pp. 465–472). Urbana-Champagn, IL: Philosophy of Education Society.
Lingis, A. (1994). The community of those who have nothing in common. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Newton, A. Z. (1995). Narrative ethics. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Nussbaum, M. C. (1990). Love’s knowledge: Essays on philosophy and literature. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Seixas, P. (2004). Theorizing historical consciousness. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Simon, R. I. (2005). The touch of the past: Remembrance, learning, and ethics. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Simon, R. I., Rosenberg, S., & Eppert, C. (Eds.). (2000). Between hope and despair: Pedagogy and the remembrance of historical trauma. New York: Rowman & Littlefield.
Sommer, D. (1994). Resistant texts and incompetent readers. Poetics Today, 15, 523–551.
Sommer, D. (1999). Proceed with caution, when engaged by minority writing in the Americas. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Sommer, D. (2000). Attitude, its rhetoric. In M. Garber, B. Hanssen, & R. L. Walkowitz (Eds.), The turn to ethics. New York: Routledge.
Straub, J. (Ed.). (2005). Narration, identity, and historical consciousness. New York: Berghahn.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Chinnery, A. On Timothy Findley’s The Wars and Classrooms as Communities of Remembrance. Stud Philos Educ 33, 587–595 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11217-014-9406-7
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11217-014-9406-7