The theme for this week in Dr. Murphree was experiential learning and internships for undergraduate students to seek. The students seemed to enjoy the speaker, a University of Central Florida faculty who was a part of UCF’s experiential learning. The guest speaker, on Tuesday, discussed the use of handshake and the ability to market yourself on this website. Internships were the highlight of the website with students able to try and ascertain one from Handshake. I was very nervous about outright stating the utility of the website in regard to history majors. Upon searching through the site, I found listings for more museum curation such as Orange County Regional History Center which had been there for roughly a year. My internship spawned from my interest with teaching the course and it’s importance for new undergraduate history students. I believed my insight, given on Thursday, was more applicable for the students in Dr. Murphree’s, though Handshake and Experiential Learning should not be dismissed.
Discussions held on Thursday had students discuss the events
of previous classes as little time were allocated to students previously.
Students voiced their opinions on internships as they debated the utility of
the lecture. Some students voiced that because they were seniors, it would be difficult
to find an internship so late into the semester. Others seemed to admit
interest in starting an internship which I voiced my suggestion to discuss with
Dr. French who is the director for internships in the History Department.
Another suggestion for websites that would benefit history majors was H-Net
which had multiple job offerings at universities. Overall, students agreed that
the lecture was useful, yet broad in its audience in comparison to history
majors.
One point of discussion occurred on Thursday regarding a
professionalization opportunity a student attended. Dr. Murphree tasks students
with attending two professionalization opportunities which are lectures that
can be applied to our field of history. One of these opportunities was a
graduate workshop hosted by the American Historical Association. The student heard
one of the speakers discussing the role of politics on the historical
discourse. This graduate speaker spoke that politics always applies to our work
and continues to influence future endeavors within the field. The student
politely voiced their disapproval of this and further indulged the speaker to
elaborate more on what they had meant.
After a long discussion, Dr. Murphree and this student
brought this discussion to the class regarding politics and the field of
history. Some students maintained the thesis that politics continued to shape
how history is formed. For myself, I was conflicted as I immediately believed
that politics, while regulating our work, does not influence it as we believe
it does. The conversation shifted towards historians’ role as proactive or
reactive. Should historians be writing for social changes or should historians
be observers? An African American historian would seem to be more likely to
advocate for social changes while a Roman historian may seem less inclined to
advocate for political change. These questions are vital to how historians conduct
themselves and their perception of their work. The message historians send could
be interpreted as political advocacy or scholarly literature.
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