“An Irish Epitaph”. 1807. Photograph. From Library of Congress Prints and Photographs, British Cartoon Prints collection.
This lesson is part of a series of lessons about "The Other" in early modern European history. These lessons introduce students to three groups that were constructed as "the other" at various times and in various regions of early modern Europe and beyond: the Irish, Jews, and witches. The guiding question of these lessons is: How and why were the Irish, Jews, and witches defined as "the other" in early modern Europe?
As these lessons are scheduled toward the end of the semester, students have already been introduced to the social, economic, and religions history of early modern Europe. Students have also engaged with primary sources, including visual primary sources.
In HIST 255, these lessons on "the other" form an important part of the preparation for the signature assignment. This is an essay in two parts. In the first part, students take the analytical perspective of a historian. In the second part, students write a fictional primary source by taking the perspective of a historical person. The lessons on the "the other" help students to analyze the historical experiences of minority groups and to create narratives about marginalized early modern communities.
During this lesson, students learn how early modern majorities defined minorities as "the other" In particular, students analyze how processing of othering and social exclusion of minorities worked in the early nineteenth-century British Isles by observing and reflecting on an anti-Irish cartoon.
By first closely observing this primary source, students record the visual and verbal techniques employed by cartoons to mock and disparage the Irish. By reflecting on a series of guided questions, students identity the discriminatory intent and content of the cartoon.
Students thus engage in research as a three-step process, first, recording of as many variables as possible through careful observation; second, reflecting on a primary source in the context of secondary sources and other primary sources and thereby coming to a conclusion about the meaning of the primary source; and third, developing further questions.
History, Irish Studies
One class period of 75 minutes
HIST 255: Life, Death, and Everything in Between in Early Modern Europe
Dr. Ute Lotz-Heumann, Department of History and Division for Late Medieval & Reformation Studies, and Mary Feeney, University of Arizona Libraries
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