HIST 420

Sr. Seminar: John Hope Franklin

Roger Williams University

GHH 205

M, TH 3:30 - 4:50

Fall, 2009

Michael R. H. Swanson Ph. D.

Office:  GHH 215

Hours: T, 11:00-12:30

M, W, F,  1:00-2:00

Phone:  (254)-3230

E-mail:  SenSemFranklin@gmail.com

Mike Swanson Writes:

I'd like to get as close as possible to sorting out the chapters we're going to study in the student led portion of the class.  I want you to think of these as like mini-classes.  Each individual or team will prepare a study guide of some sort for their "students", and students will respond to these as they would in an ideal class. 

To prepare the ground for this, I've prepared a "discussions" page. On appear the names of the class members/teams, and as they make their choices, the Franklin Essay they wish to present to the class.  Once you've made your choice, e-mail me at the class e-mail address or at mswanson401@msn.com. I'm going let these go first come-first served, so check that page first to see what has been chosen already. 

You may begin preparing your study guide as soon as you've made your choice.  The study guide may include

• Themes you think most important
  

• Questions for discussion
  

• issues raised either by the  topic or Franklin's presentation of it.
  

• Additional readingt-viewing (if you find interesting material on the web relative to the discussion point people in the right direction.
  

Assigning of dates will be a separate process.  I'd like to have you aim for 30-35 minutes each, which will let us do as many as two in a class session. 

After your presention is done, I want you to reflect on it in your journal--what went right, what glitched, and what you might have done differently, given the opportunity to do it again.

Mike Swanson Writes:

I would like to spend some time hearing from you regarding what you've found in the journals you were assigned.  If you found nothing of interest, that makes for a short report.  Just say so in your Journal.

If you find something (or things) interesting, write a little about that, and from among the things you find interesting, choose something as a sample to show us all.  A sample should be just that--a segment-page which reflects both the topic and the tone on the topic adopted by the writer.  Refer to my entry on What to do with the Darkies for an example of a sample of the type I'd like to have you share with us.

  Heather Writes:  have not finished looking through all of the journals yet, and I have been unable to find much that might be of use to people in what I have searched.  I did find one that may be helpful or interesting to anyone dealing with slavery and possibly the slave trade.  The article describes the voyage of of a slave ship from Africa.

"A Cruise on a Slaver", J.C. Cremony - Overland Monthly and Out West Magazine, Nov. 1868 Vol. I, Issue 5

Justin Cirisoli's Proposal:

I want to research the history and evolution of African-American's in higher education from their freedom as slaves up to the contemporary period.  Within in this topic, I don't want to focus on just the history and evolution but put a larger focus on institutional racism in higher education and whether or not insitutions of higher learning were in fact racist themselves.

We see now in higher education the rise of topics such as inclusive excellence and multiculturalism, but I want to look at the roots of those topics in comparison to African Americans and their journey from reconstruction to now in higher education.

Tom Bushel Writes:

After looking through both of my assigned journals, I only came up with one relevant article.  It is titled "Negro Labor in Virginia" and comes from The Galaxy Volume 0025 Issue 1 (January 1878).  It mostly explains how black people are all lazy and are awful farmers.

Ted Beatty's Proposal:

I have decided to explore the economic issues surrounding African Americans during the 30's and 40's. Specifically focusing on sturggles with loans and credit. Why was it so difficult for people of color to get a loan? Why were the loan company at risk for loaning to people of color? What were the alternative means to buyiung property and vehicles if the availability of buying on credit was not there for people of color?

I plan to parallel to do a cross reference sampleing of three time persiods to explore the availability for African American economic equality in America. I plan to specifically use the years 1885, 1945 and 2005. This will allow my audience to see the development through the years and sample how far we have come to this notion of economic equality. Have we achieved economic equlaity and if not what are some things we can do to begin this movement?

Stephen Clark' Proposal:

As for my research paper, I'm still interested in researching African-Americans/Blacks in the Armed Forces, probably the United States Army. I would like to discover how segregation in the military worked at this time and how it was maintained by the military. I also want to see if these segregated units saw action and if so, what were their accomplishments? John Hope Franklin discussed the military so I don't believe that I will have any trouble relating the subject to his works.

Dana Di Santo's Proposal:

I would like to learn more about the strive for equality of education for African Americans.

" Likewise, the idea of a common school education in the United States was conceived and promoted for white chidren who, presumably would undergo a leavening experience that would give them a sense of equality, however, were denied such an opportunity because..."

John Hope Franklin  brings up a very interesting point.  In a country striving to be more democratic, equality did not mean everyone was equal, but more that all whites were equal.  It is strange that the country would be in such a different mindset to leave behind the black children.  Is in not the children that help create a successful future?  Blacks were seen as incapable of gaining intelligence and this alone seems like a ridiculous reason to stop education among them.

Following the education of African Americans and pin pointing where education finally began  for them is something that I would like to research more.

Heather Gullberg's Proposal:

In his final Jefferson lecture, Equality Indivisible, Franklin says, “The inequities were nowhere more glaring than in the determination to exclude Negroes from a fair share of relief and employment during the depression and the New Deal years.” The Great Depression was a very difficult time for most Americans, but I think for my paper I would like to research further the affect it had on the African American population, specifically the way they were discriminated against under FDR’s New Deal programs, and how FDR felt about the situation

Brittany Pacheco's Proposal:

After a lot of searching on my own and with the assistance of the library, I have been unable to come up with any significant amount of information about Chinese education through any forum about the U.S. Civil Rights Movement. Although I am disappointed that I cannot pursue this topic, I think my back-up option should also be very interesting. After watching the slideshow of mass produced postcards of lynchings, I started to think about doing something with the history or significance of lynching as well as the efforts to outlaw it with anti-lynching laws. There will be a lot more information available for this particalur issue, so I feel confident that I will be to use this as the topic for my research paper.

Brian Korzen's Proposal:

I still have not tighten what i would like to do for research will probally do that over the weekend.  I want to look into blacks in the military and their overall effect on maybe military strategy, rules and battles.  Not sure which war I would like to do I am thinking between the Civil War and World War 2.  I think either one would be interesting to research deeply in.  In relating to the civil war, i find it interesting that for the confederate army slaves in the south were forced to fight in their armies while in the north, free african americans were able to enlist, though only allowed to be in all black regiments, while the officers were white.  I find it interesting that still in world war 2, there were all black regiments and they were led by white officers.  I think looking into something like this would be fun to do.

Mike Swanson Says:

As of three o'clock these are what I have.  It's a good start. I've copied these word for word from your journal entries--so if you notice any grammar glitches or misspellings I'd like to have you fix them so the page and the future pages will look more professional.  Just edit your original and let me know you've done so.

What I'd like to have you do now (besides get a proposal before the group if you haven't done so already) is visit each other's journals and offer comments or questions or suggestions to help clarify and focus the proposals as originally given.  This is what seminar collaboration is all about.  Do it for all of them if you possibly can.

You will notice that a couple of you have topics pretty close together--two on military, two on education.  Can I ask you to work with each other to make sure you don't step on each other's toes.  There are plenty of ways to elaborate or restrict these or other subjects in such a way that nobody winds up crowding someone else.