A Silent Revolution : Teachers views on the use of different perspectives in the history subjec

According to the steering documents from the Education administration (Skolverket), history in upper secondary schools should teach students to approach history from “different perspectives”. In this paper, I interviewed five history teachers regarding their interpretation of phrasing with regard to the subject of “perspectives”. The study aims to give insight into what kind of content the formulations of the Education administration result in, when interpreted by the teachers. It investigate what the teachers in the study think a “perspective” is, and what it means to teach history from different ditto. Which perspectives are the focuses of their history courses? I also discuss what the purpose and end of using different perspectives in history education is perceived to be, from what the interviews can reveal. For this I use Gert Biestas theory that suggests that good education aim at either qualification, socialisation of subjectification. The result show that all the teachers in the study primarly connect perspectives to different groups. Students should be allowed to to focus on the history of different category’s of people, or use their historical empathy to understand the view of others. The groups of people that the respondents most often accentuated in the interviews where people from different social classes, women, as well as different groups of people that experienced the European colonialism in the 18th and 19th century. The teacher’s in my study also described the usage of “different perspectives” in another way. They talked of this activity in terms of teaching students critically thinking and examining the subject of history as a science. To teach from “different perspectives” could, in this kind of answer, be to have student’s examine historical knowledge as a constructed product and teach them to analyse historical narratives critically. Other, less prominent interpretations involved “perspectives” as referring to different disciplines within the subject of history – such as social history, economical history or political history. When examining what aims the teachers seem to have with their described usage of perspectives I found that they often seem to emphasise the important of the students becoming analytic, critical thinking, capable individuals. I also found that the teachers many times want to pass on social norms and values, make the students tolerant and empathetic. They also want to start processes where the students ask themselves existential questions or find help in orientating themselves in social structures and form identities. Also, the respondents often expressed ideas of history as an emancipating subject where the exposing of structures and historical injustices could counteract power structures in the present.