Frances Ce Liang

Professor Erin Dietel-Mclaughlin

WR-13300-SS13

30 November 2014

Script of the TED Talk

Introduction
Good afternoon everyone. Today, I am here to talk about something that fascinates
everyonethe films. Doubtlessly, films have become an indispensible part of todays
popular culture. Among all the genres, the historical feature films, which present the
events occurring long ago in a lively and vivid way, have attracted increased public
attention during the past several decades.

Just like any other type of historical documents, such historical feature films serve as
reflections upon special moments in history, thus shaping audiences perspectives of
these events in many a way. Unfortunately, due to the dramatic elements contained
and the non-documentary nature of such films, most historians and history instructors
strongly disapprove of their use in academic research or instruction. However, to me,
this notion is pathetically as widespread as it is biased. Today, I am going to examine
several landmark films that depict the American Civil War from different perspectives,
explore their roles in classroom and public education, in order to demonstrate the fact

that films could be and should be regarded as a valuable tool for classroom as well as
public history instruction.

Evoking Empathy and Fostering Interest: Films Role in History Class

As visual media, films present actual historical events through motion pictures instead
of words and sentences, and thats why they could achieve stronger emotional
influence on an audience than most written documents do. As a result, such films tend
to play a more significant role in evoking the students empathy and stimulating their
interests toward history in in-class history teaching. Reflecting on my own experience,
I found out that in fact, it was the American historical films I watched in high school
that evoked my interest and passion in US history, the foundation of the presentation I
am delivering today. Well, as a high school freshman, I knew pretty little about US
history in general, so I signed up for an entire year of US history course without
hesitation. Unfortunately, after taking two semesters of US history courses and
spending countless hours memorizing lengthy names and intriguing historical facts
listed in my textbook, I still felt that these events which occurred decades or even
centuries ago, were so far away from my life, so I soon lost both passion and interest.
Luckily, before I was about to give up, I signed up for the US History and Films
class, in which we watched and studied a number of non-documentary films depicting
US history under the suggestions of my high school counselor. Magically, things were
changed.

For instance, take the Civil War period as an example, before taking this class, even
though I remembered all the basic information about the war in order to pass the test,

I never had a chance to get to know the roles that black people played in the overall
development of the war, nor did I ever view the war with any personal emotions.
However, my role as a passive viewer was transformed into that of an active thinker
by the 1989 drama war film Glory, which tells the story of the first formal unit of
Union Army that was made up entirely of African American soldiers. When watching
this film in class, I was particularly touched by one scene near the end of the film: as
the camera zooms in, showing both a flying Confederacy flag and a field of dead
black Union soldiers with bare feet, the narrative of the film is brought to a
conclusion with the burial of Colonel Robert Shaw in a mass grave along with the rest
of his men. Clearly, the death and burial of both white and black men serve as a
metaphor for the hard struggle against the racial prejudices. As a result, It was this
film that fostered my indignation towards the cruelty of the war and slavery, as well
as my empathy for the black soldiers who fought bravely alongside white men. In
other words, it was this class building up the connections between historical facts and
visual art that renewed my overall understanding of American Civil War as well as
US history in general, which used to be rather vague and uncertain.

Lost Cause Films: Films as Useful Tools Helping Students Comprehend

History in a Broader Social Context
Speaking of American Civil War, although 150 years have gone by since its outbreak,
it still remains a highly controversial and potent theme in mainstream popular culture.
The films depicting this debatable event, which are subjectively written, directed and
acted by those who hold varying viewpoints towards the nature and morality of the
war, could be regarded as multi-angle cases showing students the complexity of
American Civil War, and encouraging them to understand the war in a broader social

context and to think critically.

Generally, the American Civil War has long been regarded as a righteous war that
saw the reunion of a divided country and granted freedom to millions of slaves
struggling in pain. However, according to my personal experience as a high school
student, any class discussion regarding the American Civil War required some
understanding of the Lost Cause of the Confederacy, which is usually defined as an
ideology that reflects white Southerners conviction in their causes righteousness.
(Levin 33)
For instance, the popular 1939 production of Margaret Mitchells bestselling novel
Gone With the Wind is an example of the Lost Cause Narrative. As stated by Bostonbased history educator and author Kevin Levin, although neither Scarlett OHara nor
Rhett Butler represent strictly defined Lost Cause stereotypes, the movie offers
opportunities to explore depictions of slavery and racial relations.(36) Here, the
depictions of slavery and racial relations (36) Levin emphasized can be located
throughout the film. In the film, slaves are portrayed as docile and faithful members
of the OHara family, even remaining loyal after the Union Army emancipated them
all and risking their lives for the survival of the family. The relationship between
Scarlett and Mammy, in particular, provides opportunities to explore the complex
interaction between masters and slaves in Old South.

Obviously, this unique portrayal of the black people in Civil War greatly differs from
both the demeaning depiction of former slaves in The Birth of A Nation, which I will
discuss later, and the glorified representation of black soldiers in Glory. This
difference, in particular, provides teachers a perfect chance to have the students
engaged in a case study exploring the social origins of these varying perspectives

towards blacks role in the Civil War. As Levin suggests, examining historical films
could be, and should be regarded as a vital part of history education in class, and
when it comes to Civil War films, in particular, teachers should encourage their
students to view films as cultural texts highlighting varying perspectives on race,
society, and national identity.

Outside the Classroom: Films Roles in Public History Education

So, as we have discussed films roles in in-class history teaching, what about their
values in public history education? If we view the influence of American Civil War in
a broader social context, we would observe that in fact, it is the modern media, films
in particular, that maintain the public interests toward Civil War and related historical
figures and events. In other words, such films have achieved more remarkable success
in public history education than any type of written documents. From early
Hollywood films Gone with the Wind and The Birth of A Nation, to the recent epic
historical dramas like Lincoln, the Civil War has been and remains a potent and longlasting theme in mainstream culture. The reason for this noteworthy social
phenomenon has been revealed by Gloria Goodale in her article From 'Glory' to
'Gone with the Wind,' Fascination with Civil War Endures. In the article, Goodale
suggests that the general public's perception of the American Civil War is
significantly shaped by popular culture on the subject, largely because it is virtually
the only exposure they have to the subject matter. (Goodale 42) Here, Dr. Goodale is
insisting that to the people who are not quite well-educated, hardly having chances or
even abilities to read and fully understand formal academic documents, such
historical feature films serve as the only path through which they could get an idea of
what actually took place in the countrys history.

Whats more, as a commercialized modern media as well as an art form, films tend to
present historical events in a dramatized yet relatively more attractive way. To be
more specific, although many historians perceive Hollywoods historical drama from
a strictly professional way, the viewers by contrast react quite positively because such
films also satisfy their story expectations. Thus, such films have successfully fostered
audiences fascination with history and defined their historical outlooks in general.
Question for you all: who would like to read the boring Colonial American books if
they have another way to get to know this history to watch the Patriot starring Mel
Gibson? Here, we might reach another conclusion that such films work not only as a
major educational resources through which the public comprehend, interpret, and
appreciate history, but also a credible source of information for historians and
sociologists studying the publics responses to certain historical events, wars or
movements.

Conclusion

Now, after examining the ways in which the mainstream films fuse filmic and nonfilmic discourses in order to stage the American Civil War on screen, I am able to
reiterate my claim here. On the one hand, historical films vividly visualize actual
historical events together with a broad social context. On the other hand, they depict
the controversial historical events from various perspectives, thus assembling a
historically and culturally meaningful narrative about America's past for
contemporary viewers. Taken together, the non-documentary historical feature films
could be, and should be regarded as valuable sources that greatly assist the students
and the public in comprehending and studying the US history in general and the Civil
War in particular.