Chapter 4: The Two World Histories

In the United States, public discourse over the teaching of world history in precollegiate education has largely taken place in two separate arenas. The educators, intellectuals, and policymakers in these two arenas have not fully understood or engaged with one another. In one arena are scholars and teachers who subscribe to the idea that the primary field of investigation in world history education should be the planet as a whole and that instructors must address not only the histories of discreet cultures and civilizations but also interconnections, large-scale patterns of change, and comparative developments. The educators in the other arena, by contrast, assume world history to be the study of the attributes and achievements of different named cultures, including Western civilization. This essay argues that educators in the “civilizationist” arena, despite serious differences among them, largely dominate curriculum decision making in the 50 states. Their approach, however, is an inadequate, misleading, and outdated foundation for international education in the twenty-first century. Therefore, the arena advocating genuinely world-scale study of the past, an endeavor supported by innovative research in the past several decades, must do far more than it has so far to influence curriculum design and the classroom experience.