Florida weighs in on post-modernism

Sandy Levinson

The following section, relating to the required curriculum, of the Florida Omnibus Education Bill was recently passed by the Florida legislature and signed by Gov. Jeb Bush (declared, incidentally, by the Weekly Standard on its cover as "the best governor in America"):

(g) The history of the United States, including the

2 period of discovery, early colonies, the War for Independence,

3 the Civil War, the expansion of the United States to its

4 present boundaries, the world wars, and the civil rights

5 movement to the present. The history of the United States

6 shall be taught as genuine history and shall not follow the

7 revisionist or postmodernist viewpoints of relative truth.

8 American history shall be viewed as factual, not as

9 constructed, shall be viewed as knowable, teachable, and

10 testable, and shall be defined as the creation of a new nation

11 based largely on the universal principles stated in the

12 Declaration of Independence.

What can this possibly mean? Would it be permissible for a history teaching in Florida to present, say, conflicting views of the Jacksonians and the Cherokees regarding the forced removal from Georgia, on the ground that it is simply a fact, and not constructed, that there were, indeed, conflicting views regarding the forced removal? Query, is it permitted to call it "The Trail of Tears," given that this is certainly a "constructed" term, just as, indeed, is the case with "the Holocaust" (see Peter Novick's excellent book on the subject) or, for that matter, "the French and Indian War, which is the American name for the Seven Years War.

Note that the young must be taught that that it is simply the case (and not a constructed notion) that the "new nation [was] based largely on universal principles stated in the Declaration of Independence." Does the "largely" allow a Florida teacher to note that these "univeral principles" were denied with regard to (for starters) slaves, women, indentured servants and others without property, Jews, "Mohammedans," in some colonies non-Protestants, etc., or are these "constructed" notions.

Does the "civil rights movement to the present" include teaching about women's rights, including access to abortions, disability rights, and gay- and lesbian-rights? Could labor history, which is omitted from the list, be shoehorned into the "civil rights movement" (even though organized labor was often antagonistic to the move for full rights for African-Americans)?

Is it relevant whether a single member of the Florida legislature (or "America's best governor") could get even a "Gentleman's C" on a test question asking them to discuss "relativism" and "post-modernist viewpoints of relative truth"?

Finally, are there any "relatists" or "post-modernists" who deny that American history is "knowable, teachable, and testable"? What would it mean to assert this?

I look forward to finding out whether the Florida legislature will similarly declare that the "correspondence theory of truth" is correct and that, say, Thomas Kuhn (or perhaps David Hume) cannot be taught in the Florida public schools, except as exemplars of error, and so on. (Incidentally, would it violate the statute to teach one or another of Justice Holmes's savage dismissals of the notion of natural law?)

Is this legislation basically harmless venting by ignorami who should simply be ridiculed by people like me (and, I suspect, most of the readers of this blog), or is it something "we" should be worried about? I omit, of course, the third option, which is that reasonable people should be grateful that the Florida legislature is willing to stand up to the "relativists" and "post-modernists" who are destroying America. Am I wrong to do so?
Posted 12:28 PM by Sandy Levinson [link]