Plenary: Caroline Coffin

Title: Reconstruing 'personal time' as 'collective time': learning the
discourse of history


Abstract

Time plays a key role in historical discourse.  It is important, then,
for students to have a sound appreciation of how to represent time if
they want to successfully write about the past.  Research suggests,
however, that the utilisation of chronological order and the
representation of the duration of historical periods are difficult
tasks for adolescents (Carretero et al, 1991, 35). The fact that many
school history students have difficulty in handling and expressing
temporal relations is therefore of concern.

In this paper I argue that linguistic analysis within the systemic
functional tradition can offer powerful insights into the way that
successful students use lexicogrammar in their writing to move from
personally oriented representations of time to ones that are
historical in nature.  In particular, I show how the analysis makes it
possible to answer such questions as:

- How does historical time differ from everyday notions of time?

- What is the role of time in developing historical notions of
continuity and discontinuity?

- In what way can time be regarded as an ideological tool?

- What difficulties does time present for students learning to write
history? What do they need to learn about expressing concepts of time
in order to be successful in their writing?

Reference:

Carretero, M., Asensio, M. and Pozo, J. (1991) 'Cognitive Development,
Historical Time Representation and Causal explanations in
Adolescence', in Learning and Instruction, Oxford, U.K., Pergamon
Press, vol. 3, pp. 27- 48.