Matthias Oppermann ist wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter am Lehrstuhl North American Literary and Cultural Studies der Universität Bielefeld.

2.3 Radical Teaching Contra Cultural Consensus?§As Mechling, Meredith, and Wilson (1973) have suggested, the effects of the rapid growth of American studies during the 1960s are by no means exclusively positive. American studies scholarship of the time seems marked by a sense of both maturation and crisis. As early as 1963, Hennig Cohen assessed that§The American Studies movement has become just a little tired, careworn, and taken for granted. Once something of a siren, she is now somewhat fleshed out and matronly, and at moments capable of observing her household and progeny with a degree of self-satisfaction. But if she is no longer slim and starry-eyed, she has a better sense of discipline, balance, and of her own limitations, while retaining her original energy, curiosity, and purposefulness. (Cohen 1963, 550) §The mid-1960s were generally considered something of a turning point in the academic status and development of the field. In her essay on "The Mid-life Crisis of American Studies," Doris Friedensohn remarked that "American Studies had Cinderella status" in the academy until the mid- to late 1960s (1972, 372). Gene Wise referred to the period that followed the mid-1960s as "the 'coming apart' stage of American Studies" (1979b, 312). What exactly was coming apart? And what led to this heightened sense of crisis?§One likely answer to both questions entails a reference to the holistic and consensual notion of the culture concept that still operates in the mid-1960s. Despite its diversity and heterogeneity, a national culture-as it was understood by scholars like Hennig Cohen in the early 1960s (see above)-was based primarily on cultural consensus. In his article "Cultural History and American Studies: Past, Present, and Future" (1971), Robert Sklar described the 1960s as a time of increasing disillusionment with this idea of American cultural consensus:§During the 1960s the premises of an optimistic and largely uncritical American cultural consensus were shattered. Where most Americans had once perceived a society of affluence and well-being, many now began to see poverty and mal-nutrition. Where most Americans had accepted their nation's military and economic role in the world as benevolent and necessary, many now began to regard it as destructive and imperialistic. Where it had been generally assumed that economic and material growth were the signs of a thriving society, many now sensed that growth meant pollution and ecological crisis. Where it had been expected that assimilation and an end to discrimination were rapidly being achieved, many began to find identity and pride in heightened racial and sexual consciousness, confrontation, and separation. Groups which had seemed only peripherally or covertly or inconsequently a part of American culture-blacks, Chicanos, Puerto Ricans, Indians, women, homosexuals-demanded to be recognized as part of the whole culture of the United States, as well as asserting their rights to create their own histories and determine their own cultural role. (Sklar 1971, 3-4) §Sklar's account highlights some of the issues that led to a radical critique of the notion of cultural consensus. Diverse social movements and identity politics came to the fore in various public arenas. These changes had profound effects on research and curricula in American higher education. §First, as minorities started to enter universities in larger numbers, many of the questions asked in political arenas were also rightfully asked about curricula in American studies, like "where are the blacks?" and "where are the women?" (Lauter 1999, 31). Second, the political turmoil of the 1960s put considerable strain on existing explanatory frameworks of earlier American studies. Depending on political perspective, the necessary changes to the field are today perceived as "salutary" by some, and unhealthy by others. James E. Hartley (on the more conservative side of the political spectrum) agrees that the 1960s were

Table of Contents§Acknowledgmentsix§Introduction12§Histories of Curricular Innovation§1. American Studies as Curricular Innovation: Interventions into Narratives of Field Formation35§1.1 "A Subject So Familiar and So Simple": American Literature and American Civilization in the College Curriculum38§1.2 Money, Jingoism, and Folklore? American Studies after World War II55§1.3 Bridging the Schisms of Culture and Method: "Peaux Rouges" and "Mandarins" in Minnesota75§2. Maturity and Midlife Crises: Radical Teachers, Cultural Turns86§2.1 Quantitative Growth and Organizational Structures in the 1960s and 1970s88§2.2 Cultural Experts and Literary Amateurs in the Early 1960s 94§2.3 Radical Teaching Contra Cultural Consensus?100§2.4 Collaborators, Computers, Problem-Solvers: Minnesota, Pennsylvania, and Davis (Re-)Considered107§Trajectories of Transformation§3. Multiculturalism as Radical Critique: American Studies Beyond the Nation131§3.1 Social Movements, European Theory, and the Search for Resistance134§3.2 Contextualizing Cultural Studies: The Political Work of Cultural Critique140§3.3 Dialogics Beyond Borders: American Culture Studies146§3.4 From Coverage to Contact Zones: Curricula of Comparative U.S. Cultures152§4. American Studies in the Age of Digital Cultures165§4.1 American Studies and New Media166§4.2 Culture and Database: George Allen's Curse, Chris Crocker's Cupcake171§4.3 New Media-New American Studies?179§Expansions of the Field-Imaginary§5. American Studies and the Learning Paradigm187§5.1 Understanding Student Learning193§5.2 Novice, Expert, and Beyond203§5.3 Does American Studies Have "Signature Pedagogies"?214§6. From Best Practices to Next Practices226§6.1 Going Meta: Towards a Scholarship of Teaching in American Studies227§6.2 Pedagogies and Epistemologies: Notes from the Visible Knowledge Project234§6.3 Digital Storytelling: Adaptive, Embodied, and Socially Situated245§Epilogue266§List of Tables273§Bibliography274§Index292

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