Why do we teach History? History, Education and Roleplaying
Why do we teach history? This question may seem obvious but in light of recent scaling back of history and humanities programs it bears consideration. Others have answered this question more deeply but I will provide a few reasons of my own before discussing how roleplaying fits in. History helps us understand where we came from and why things are the way are now. These origin stories help give context to our understanding of modern life. The origin of history is basically just memory and stories. History teaches cause and effect , or at least provides data on correlations. We can look at how all sort of historical events have panned out over time and use that information to help inform our decisions about the future. History as an academic subject stems from this 'leadership training' approach. History trains us to decide what is true and what is important . Every historian, student or even reader of history must make decisions about what to include or exclude an...