Description
Book SynopsisA Primer for Teaching Pacific Histories is a guide for college and high school teachers who are teaching Pacific histories for the first time or for experienced teachers who want to reinvigorate their courses. It can also serve those who are training future teachers to prepare their own syllabi, as well as teachers who want to incorporate Pacific histories into their world history courses. Matt K. Matsuda offers design principles for creating syllabi that will help students navigate a wide range of topics, from settler colonialism, national liberation, and warfare to tourism, popular culture, and identity. He also discusses practical pedagogical techniques and tips, project-based assignments, digital resources, and how Pacific approaches to teaching history differ from customary Western practices. Placing the Pacific Islands at the center of analysis, Matsuda draws readers into the process of strategically designing courses that will challenge students to think critically about
Trade Review“This is an inspired and inspiring text—a welcome and much needed contribution rich with resources, pedagogical innovation, and practical strategies. Conceptually exciting, it takes an ‘assemblage’ approach that emphasizes relationships and connections between actors and events across time. It offers a rethinking as to what constitutes the Pacific world itself—from the margins to the center, particularly from the Pacific Rim to the Oceanic basin—all while emphasizing connectivity in relation to global histories.” -- J. Kehaulani Kauanui, author of * Paradoxes of Hawaiian Sovereignty: Land, Sex, and the Colonial Politics of State Nationalism *
“Bringing multiple aspects of Pacific histories together in new and welcome ways, Matt K. Matsuda provides a more comprehensive approach to teaching the field than any other publication that currently exists.” -- Heather Streets-Salter, author of * World War One in Southeast Asia: Colonialism and Anticolonialism in an Era of Global Conflict *
"This book is an assemblage of key concepts in Pacific histories, topic and primary text suggestions, pedagogical approaches, and discussion-based exercises for the classroom. With its pragmatic approaches to pedagogy, this book would be useful for environmentally minded educators who seek to integrate transnational, decolonial, and Indigenous perspectives in understanding environmental history, literature, and social movements." -- Heidi Amin-Hong * ISLE *
“
A Primer for Teaching Pacific Histories outlines a course with a rich, welcome, and innovative historical perspective on the broader Pacific region.” -- David Hanlon * Contemporary Pacific *
“In
A Primer for Teaching Pacific Histories, Matt Matsuda offers guidance on course structure, themes for inquiry, and resources to consult. The author’s multitude of overarching main ideas and supporting examples supply enough fundamentals for instructors working outside of their comfort zone as well as seasoned scholars looking for new perspectives.” -- Michelle Ladwig Williams * Pacific Affairs *
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments vii
Introduction: Objectives 1
Part I. Foundations
1. Begin with the State of Our Knowledge 19
2. Secure the Fundamentals: Navigation, Diaspora, Settlement 25
3. Underscore the Connections: Encounters in the Contact Zone 33
4. Review Disputed Legacies and Arguments 51
Part II. Devising Strategies
5. Imperialism as a Teaching Tool 67
6. Anthropology and Ethnology as Teaching Tools 89
7. Conflict as a Teaching Tool 95
8. Identity as a Teaching Tool 105
Part III. Performed Histories
9. Distinguish Representations and Realities 113
10. See the Process of Enacting Knowledge 121
Notes 145
Selected Bibliography 155
Index 161
