The purpose of the study is to compare high school history textbooks in Korea, China, Japan and Vietnam to confirm different perspectives and to look into if each textbook is appropriate to give classes for multiperspectivity.
Multiperspectivity is a...
The purpose of the study is to compare high school history textbooks in Korea, China, Japan and Vietnam to confirm different perspectives and to look into if each textbook is appropriate to give classes for multiperspectivity.
Multiperspectivity is an attitude and skill that is important in history education and intercultural education. Multiperspectivity is to understand an event by considering two or more different perspectives in history education. To foster this in history classes, I analyzed whether there were descriptions of ethnocentrism or nationalism, and whether there were descriptions of interactions in history textbooks.
In particular, the war was appropriate to compare the views of different countries on the same event, so I chose examples of the Korean War and the Vietnam War.
The composition and content of the textbooks in the four countries are not enough to give students a chance learning multiple perspectives. However, the situation is better for textbooks of Korea and Japan under the approval system rather than those of China and Vietnam which are under the state control.
Relatively, the composition of Korea history textbooks was positive in that they showed various materials, while Japanese textbooks had the advantage of detailing events. Overall, however, all four countries showed a tendency toward ethnocentrism or nationalism in their textbook descriptions. Regarding the elements of migration and interaction, it is only briefly described in textbook of Korea, and other countries are without descriptions.
The limitations of the study include using only one textbook that has been adopted most among many textbooks in Korea and Japan; choosing both Korea history textbooks and East Asia history textbooks with the 2009 curriculum; applying the typical framework of cause, progress, result and effect etc. to the analysis of the text; and the failure to address multiple perspectives at the learner level.
I would like to make some suggestions carefully regarding the description of the textbook. First, the narrative system needs to be changed to a structure that reveals the opinions of the textbook author. Second, they should put a lot of controversial topics and give students opportunities to discuss frequently. Third, it is necessary to describe economic history, social history, cultural history, exchange history and oral history, including political history, and actively reflect academic research achievements. Fourth, in the case of historical events relating other countries, a more active description of regional or world history should be made together. Finally, most of all, the textbook writers should be given more options, and tests should be changed to measure critical thinking.
Multiperspectivity is useful in creating a society living well together with different people in a multicultural society by preventing and coordinating conflicts. It is the premise of all thinking, and we expect to see the ‘normality of diversity’.