Author Archives: Dr. Andrew Joseph Pegoda

Regular readers will remember my very long and question-by-question critique of the 2013 Social Studies STAAR Test. You can find the full version here and a summarized version here. I have been re-reading and re-visiting my thoughts about this test, as well as looking at the 2014 version because I was invited to give a guest talk/lead aContinue reading “The Most Racist Question (EVER?) on the Texas STAAR Test”

This postwar image and ones like it regularly appear in textbooks. Scholars use such images to make arguments about how new technologies made housework less time-consuming and advertising made these appealing necessities. Other arguments focus on the sexism of having a Woman use the vacuum in this advertisement – a Woman who is wearing an apron andContinue reading “Disguised Racism?: A Very Brief Analysis of a Postwar Image”

Teaching Texas History for the first time this semester has provided much to think about, especially questions revolving around both “What is Texas History?” and “What makes something ‘Texas History’”? Another way of looking at these questions is to ask, what gives a place its own history? Take the boundaries of the geopolitical area calledContinue reading “The Nature of History, History as Entity vs. Example, and Texas History”

Recently in the Texas History class I am teaching a student shared an example of how two friends would quasi reenact an enslaved, enslaver situation at the place where they work. The White person would tell the Black person “get to work” and so on. This student followed up in an email asking my thoughts:Continue reading “Making Light of Slavery?”

“Success” means many different things. There are as many definitions as there are people (or students in this case). “Student Success” is the current big push at colleges and universities across the nation, and this push is largely being forced upon colleges by state legislatures and federal bodies overseeing education. This well-intended goal has many definitions butContinue reading “The Emotional Costs of Student Success for Our Students”

In my Texas History class, this week and the next two weeks are devoted to the question: “How revolutionary was the Texas Revolution?” Yesterday’s lesson was “Blacks from Africa to Texas.” We looked at the development of enslavement in Texas; how (unlike in the British Colonies) it was transplanted as a pre-existing, very established institution byContinue reading “The Rhetoric of Exclusion: Assumed vs. Stated”

Teaching Texas History this semester has been a blast. Teaching is always an excellent way to learn, and teaching something from a different framework/reference point is also a way to learn.  One thing we have talked about a few times relates to: What does “6 Flags Over Texas” mean? Who and what does it includeContinue reading ““6 Flags Over Texas”: History, Rhetoric, and Deleting the Past”

On the first or second day of class each semester, I always do some version of my “What is History?” lesson with students. This lesson introduces major ideas and terms (such as agency, mores, etc) that I use all of the time. We also spend a great deal of time talking about various definitions ofContinue reading ““Nothing Happened Here”: History vs. history”