Learning history is true key to unlocking our colorful past
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Angela Dorrough |
When I first decided to become a philosophy major, I sat down with my undergraduate catalog and looked at the general education requirements for my degree. I, like so many others, immediately groaned at the prospect of taking anything not directly linked to my major.
Entering my senior year, I have fallen into a habit most other seniors have experienced before…I have saved much of my last general education requirements for the end. I began the semester with a rather self-defeating attitude that I didn’t need the vast majority of the courses on my class schedule. One class in particular, a gen ed class, has proved to be one of the most interesting courses I’ve taken thus far in college.
When I say the word “history” most people think of dates, numbers and having to memorize excruciatingly mass quantities of statistics. I, like most others, have never thought of myself as exactly talented in memorizing vast quantities of what I previously considered to be rather dull information.
The first day I stepped into my western civilization class I began to change my mind that history was a dull subject when my professor began to tell the class the objective of the course was not necessarily just dates and numbers (although that is not an unimportant part of history), but that this class was designed to teach us the history of ideas (a subject which rather interests me).
I was having a political conversation the other day with one of my friends who knows many more details about the technical inner workings of government than I do. I was surprised, however, at how I was able to speak about the ideas behind different types of governments and political ideologies—a subject my history class has often touched upon.
History is a subject I am quickly realizing, is vitally important to know. As Norman Cousins once said, “History is a vast early warning system.” There is truth to the idea we can learn from what has happened in the past, but more importantly, that we can build upon ideas of others before us. A special thanks to the history department for such an interesting class!
Southwest Standard columnist Angela Dorrough is a senior majoring in philosophy.