ABSTRACT
Middle and secondary social studies educators, school administrators, politicians, and other observers often argue that one of the primary purposes of K-12 history and social studies education is the creation of strong citizens. Look, for instance, at the National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS)’s formal statement on social studies education: “Social studies is the integrated study of the social sciences and humanities to promote civic competence,” the statement reads. “The primary purpose of social studies is to help young people develop the ability to make informed and reasoned decisions for the public good as citizens of a culturally diverse, democratic society in an interdependent world” (NCSS, 1994, p. vii). But it is not just the NCSS that connects history and social studies education to the development of democratic citizenship. Especially in the past several years, a great number of organizations and individuals have debated the question of whether and how to develop history and social studies curricula that also have the power to instruct young people in the arts of “civic competence,” “citizenship,” “democracy,” and “patriotism.” (See, for instance, Ayers, n.d.; Bender, Katz, & Palmer, 2004; Brown & Patrick, 2004; Organization of American Historians, 2004; Albert Shanker Institute, 2003.)
In this chapter, we approach the ideas of “citizenship” and “democracy” through a slightly different lens. Instead of asking how we might develop history curricula that will create good citizens, we inquire into the meaning-and engage a set of debates about the history-of citizenship and civic rights in the U.S. What exactly has “citizenship” meant in the U.S. over the past two hundred years?, we ask. In doing so, we hope to provoke, among our readers, a related set of conversations about the idea of history education and civics instruction. What does it mean to teach young people to be strong citizens, exactly? Does it mean we ought to teach students to be good future jurors, military draftees, drivers who pause at yellow traffic lights? To be thoughtful, critical voters? Is the job of an engaged citizen perhaps bigger than simply knowing and observing the law? If so, what might that encompass? And, finally, if history education is about creating engaged
citizens, what about the students in our classes who aren’t, and may never become, U.S. citizens? In short, the broad concepts of “Americanness” and “citizenship” are deployed, in the social studies and history content areas, very frequently, and with great gravity. But what, really, do these terms mean? Do they have a history? What controversies surround them?
