Teaching U.S. History in Argentina | M. Graciela Abarca

		Teaching U.S. History in Argentina M. Graciela Abarca

		In the last two decades, history students in Buenos Aires have become increasingly interested in the courses and seminars on U.S. history available at the University of Buenos Aires. Until the early 1980s, however, the largest university in the country offered no course on the history of the United States. With the end of the military dictatorship and the return of the democratic government in 1983, the academic community saw the need to update and enrich the University of Buenos Aires’s programs as well as their curricular content. As a result of this stimulating process of change, the history department introduced a number of new course offerings. Some courses, such as sociology and economics, aimed to provide history students with additional tools. Other courses offered the history of regions that had previously been ignored, such as history of Africa, Asia, Russia&emdash;and the United States. In 1985, for the first time, U.S. history became a course in the University of Buenos Aires’ undergraduate program in history (Licenciatura en Historia). The university authorities, faculty and students were very enthusiastic about the introduction of new courses, but there was still a long way to go before U.S. history, among others, could become fully established as an important component in the training of historians. First, there were practically no scholars who specialized in the field. In order to overcome this problem, the department of history signed a number of agreements with foreign universities, such as the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and embarked on a long-term plan to encourage and facilitate the specialization of scholars in the history of the United States. In 1987, after a year as visiting scholar at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Pablo Pozzi undertook the difficult task of developing the first course on U.S. history at the University of Buenos Aires. More importantly, Pozzi recruited professors who were interested in making the course a staple in the education of history majors. Apart from the lack of human resources, there was a serious lack of material resources. Most of the limited bibliography available was in English. Although a considerable number of university students understand the language, U.S. history is, of course, taught in Spanish and all required readings must be available in Spanish. In an attempt to overcome the language barrier, the history department reached an agreement with the Instituto del Profesorado en Lenguas Vivas Juan Ramón Fernandez, a college with a longstanding tradition in the training of English teachers and translators. Since 1987, English graduates from this institution have translated a large amount of U.S. history bibliography and numerous documents. This partnership has proved to be extremely fruitful, enriching the quantity and quality of the readings included in the U.S. history syllabus. In addition, the history department has received book donations from the U.S. History Program at the Mexican Institute Jose Maria Luis Mora, the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and the State University of New York at Stony Brook. Although the content of the U.S. history course has undergone numerous changes over the years, its main focus has always been on the twentieth century. This approach allows students to analyze recent historical developments in the context of the origin and evolution of the United States. In terms of historical periods, the classes center on the years between 1898 and 2000 and focus on three major aspects: the country’s social structure of accumulation, its internal conflict and social condition, and its dominant culture, viewed as a dynamic interaction between hegemony and consensus-building. The lectures and discussion sessions cover the emergence of the United States as an empire in 1898, through its consolidation as a world power in the post-World War II period, and into the 1990s debate on the “unipolar” vs. the “multipolar” world order. The course also aims to provide a thorough analysis of the 1929 capitalist crisis of accumulation, the deep economic depression that followed, and the building of the “New Deal Order.” The last classes are devoted to a discussion of the post-Vietnam War era and Reaganomics. Throughout the semester, processes such as economic and territorial expansion, social and economic conflict, and nation-building are considered crucial to the understanding of the history of the United States. Students enrolled in the course attend three classes weekly: one lecture that provides them with the necessary theoretical background and an overview of the different historical periods, and two small group sessions. In the small group sessions, professors focus on more specific issues&emdash;for instance, labor-capital relations or U.S. foreign policy toward Latin America&emdash;present historiographical questions, and student analysis of selected primary source documents. In order to meet the course’s requirements, students must pass two written exams. In addition, they must choose either to present a final research paper or to sit for a final oral exam. Most students opt for the former, so during the semester they must select a topic, develop a brief research proposal, and identify the documents they plan to analyze. This is meant to be a small exercise in the historical profession which offers professors an opportunity to discuss problems related to methodology, thesis formulation, and access to archives. In this process faculty members encourage students to reflect on issues such as the importance of historical research, the “objectivity-subjectivity” question, history and chronology, and history and its relation with other disciplines. Upon the successful completion of their research papers, a number of undergraduate history students have decided to pursue a specialization in the field. At present, eleven students are registered as adscriptos (junior researchers) in U.S. history at the University of Buenos Aires. These undergraduates are engaged in two-year independent research projects on a variety of topics. They meets periodically with the U.S. history faculty to discuss historiographical questions, share research difficulties, and present findings and conclusions. By the end of two years of work, these students should have produced papers good enough to be published in academic journals. There is no doubt that the history of the United States has finally become consolidated as an important field of historical inquiry at the University of Buenos Aires. Since 1995, the publication of the academic journal De Sur a Norte has been instrumental in fostering research in the field. This journal is edited by University of Buenos Aires faculty and the Center of American Studies in collaboration with universities in Brazil, Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay, thereby offering a South American perspective on U.S. history issues. Furthermore, history professors trained abroad are currently teaching courses at the undergraduate and graduate levels and more and better resources are available today to students and faculty interested in U.S. history. A project that started as a new course offering back in 1985 has developed into a rich academic forum for the discussion and unraveling of the many complexities present in the study of history of the United States. M. Graciela Abarca is U.S. History adjunct professor at the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina.