Indonesia: Teaching Students About My Summer Vacation

I visited Indonesia last summer with a friend of mine from Bowling Green. We went to see the astounding insects and wildlife — and found it!

This macaque’s friend ate my shorts

Astounding insects

The unexpected pleasure of the visit was meeting people on Sulawesi, a large island in the middle of the archipelago. Young and old, men and women, people across the island wanted to laugh, eat, and practice their English with us.

Hanging out with kids on the street

Meeting some gregarious girls in a Tana Toraja “death cave”

The trip also turned out to be a boon to my teaching. I teach a world history survey course and used what I learned of Indonesia’s ecology, economy, and people to show my students some of the environmental legacies and paradoxes of globalization and imperialism, and how common people live with them.

Tour Images in the US National Archives: The Fun of Doing History

One of the pleasures of history researching is to simply explore the archives and witness history as it is being made. When I research, I occasionally take a day off of the grind of pouring through the primary sources related to my project and just explore ones that I am curious to learn more about. Often, what I find is surprising and unexpected. That’s the fun of doing history yourself and not just reading about it in books.

I spent one memorable day in France’s National Library reading news stories in French papers during the first couple weeks of the invasion of France by German forces in 1940, such as Le Figaro’s trumpeting of the German invasion of Belgium in in May 1940. The French press’s compelling, real-time coverage of the Battle of France expressed the dismay, honor, patriotism, optimism, hatred, anger, and bewilderment of the moment in a way that no history book can convey.