About the Strategy

Throughout the Teaching American History course, we have talked about integrating the study and work of history with other disciplines. Nowhere is that integration more natural than when history and literature are linked.

To begin an integration of literature and history, teachers can talk with students about the ways in which the disciplines are already linked. For example, a lot of historical investigation often goes into the writing of a novel. Also, learning about the literary works and writers of a particular era can tell us a lot about the social, political, and cultural views and events of that era. Teachers may also find it useful to point out that the separation of the disciplines is a unique construct of education, and is very different from life and work outside of school where all the "subjects" are linked.

Selecting the right literary work for a class depends on many factors, including the age and reading level of the students and the content being studied. When a literature selection comes from -- and is about -- the time period being studied, it serves the dual purpose of being both a primary source and a literary resource. The setting, language, morals and mores, customs, and other trappings of society are on display alongside the fictional story the author is portraying. History students can learn a great deal and often experience history in a very different way when they encounter it in literature than when they read it in a non-fiction text. In addition to giving students some content information about a historical topic or time period, literature can go a long way toward helping students develop historical empathy -- that is, greater levels of personal understanding of the experiences of people from another historical era and/or background. Literary exploration can even have the added benefit of encouraging students to undertake historical investigations beyond the curriculum.

Once students begin reading the literature selection, their teacher should guide them in their efforts to uncover the "history" in the author's story using reading questions and discussions. These questions can help students bring the literature into a historical context by identifying key historical events and social/cultural elements contained in the text. The study of the literary work can also extend to learning about the background of the writer, which allows students to consider the writer's point of view in the storytelling.

This type of inquiry and reading is very different from the work typically undertaken in an English classroom. While English teachers do generally offer some kind of background material as an introduction to a literature selection or to put the work in context, the focus in English tends to be on literary elements, such as plot, language and style, and characterization. The history student's focus is on learning about and experiencing history through the literature. It is also important to note that, because the focus in a history classroom is the history rather than the literary elements of the story, it is appropriate to use a much shorter selection from a piece of literature, rather than having students read an entire novel. Students may, however, become so engaged while reading and discussing the shorter selection that they choose to read the rest of the story on their own.