Historical Empathy as Perspective Recognition and Care in One Secondary Social Studies Classroom

Abstract

This qualitative case study examined the place that historical empathy, as both a subjective and an objective endeavor, occupied in one teacher's instruction and her students' response. Data—collected over five months—include 29 hours of classroom observations in an Advanced Placement European History course, instructional artifacts, and interviews with the instructor and four of her 10th grade students. Findings indicate that the participating teacher promotes historical empathy as both perspective recognition and care through lecture, secondary source work, primary source work, and discussion. Each of the participating students demonstrated perspective recognition and care in the particular ways that their teacher sought to encourage; however, all of the students also exhibited failures of empathy at times. This study illustrates how various instructional practices might be used to promote historical empathy. It also sheds light on the complex interplay between the subjective and objective components of historical empathy.