Pearl Harbor: History, Memory, Memorial
July 23-28, 2006

A 2006 NEH Landmarks of American History and Culture Workshop

Thank you for your interest in “Pearl Harbor: History, Memory, Memorial,” the Landmarks of American History and Culture Workshop for Schoolteachers supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) under the We the People Initiative. Additional support for the program is provided by the Arizona Memorial Museum Association and the National Park Service.

We are pleased to provide below details of our workshop, including eligibility and application requirements. Prior to completing your application, please review the information provided and consider carefully what is expected in terms of attendance, reading and writing requirements, and participation in the work of the program. Should you have any questions, please feel free to contact the East-West Center’s AsiaPacificEd Program office (contact information provided below).

We look forward to your participation in our workshop and to welcoming you to our gorgeous island of Oahu.

Aloha,

Namji Steinemann
Director, AsiaPacificEd Program
East-West Center
Honolulu, Hawaii

Importantly, the workshop will engage you (our teachers) in intensive study and discussion of the events surrounding the 1941 Japanese attacks on Pearl Harbor and other related sites on Oahu, while providing you with direct experiences in the interpretation of the USS Arizona Memorial, the historic site (and national park) devoted to honoring those who died in the attacks, and in the use of archival materials and other resources related to the events surrounding the Pearl Harbor attacks.

This initiative is a joint effort of the East-West Center, a nonprofit research and education institution established in 1960 by the U.S. Congress to promote understanding and improved relations between the United States and the Asia Pacific region; the National Park Service, which operates the USS Arizona Memorial; and the Arizona Memorial Museum Association, a nonprofit that supports the educational activities at the Arizona Memorial.

During the workshop, you will visit the Arizona Memorial and related attack sites in order to gain a sense of the time and place represented by these historic resources. Since the history of Pearl Harbor is still a living history, you will also have the unique opportunity to meet with Pearl Harbor survivors, WW II generation residents of Hawaii, and Japanese Americans who spent the wartime years in internment camps, and experience history “come alive” through their oral histories.

Importantly, the workshop will model ways to teach collaboratively. You will engage in rigorous conversations with leading U.S. and Japanese scholars about the historical significance and meanings of the events surrounding the attacks and important cultural and historical issues that continue to shape national perceptions of Pearl Harbor. Through hands-on sessions, you will also work closely with them and with colleagues from around the country as you explore issues of content and pedagogy in teaching Pearl Harbor, including ways to integrate technology as you develop plans for collaborative projects and lesson plans. In this way, the workshop will serve as a catalyst for creating a network of educators dedicated to ongoing scholarship, professional development, and collaboration.

Click here for a draft daily schedule (subject to change).

The program will be offered at two different times during the summer of 2006: June 25-30 and July 23-28. Each workshop will begin early afternoon on Sunday (June 25 and July 23). Therefore, participants are asked to arrive in Honolulu by Saturday evening prior to the workshop.

Our workshop, which will accommodate 40 teachers per session, is designed principally for middle and high school classroom educators teaching humanities subjects in public, private, parochial, and charter schools, as well as home-schooling parents. Other K-12 school personnel, including those who teach non-humanities content as well as administrators, substitute teachers, classroom paraprofessionals, and librarians, are eligible to participate, subject to available space.

Teachers at schools in the United States or its territorial possessions, or Americans teaching in foreign schools where at least 50 percent of the students are American nationals, are eligible for this program. Applicants must be U.S. citizens, residents of U.S. jurisdictions, or foreign nationals who have been residing in the United States or its territories for at least the three years immediately preceding the application deadline. Foreign nationals teaching abroad are not eligible to apply.

The workshop will be held in Honolulu, Hawaii, and will involve visits to the USS Arizona Memorial, and other historic sites around the island of Oahu, such as the Hickam Army Airfield, the Ford Island Naval Air Station, the Wheeler Army Airfield, the Schofield Barracks, and the National Memorial of the Pacific. Participants who wish to visit the Battleship Missouri Memorial, also at Pearl Harbor, should make plans to visit it before or after the workshop.

Workshop sessions will be held at the East-West Center. The Center’s 21-acre campus is centrally located in Honolulu’s Manoa Valley and adjacent to the University of Hawaii’s and its main research library, which houses extensive collections on Hawaiian and Asia Pacific studies.

Thanks to the NEH Landmarks of American History and Culture grant and the additional support provided by the Arizona Memorial Museum Association, there is no fee for attending the workshop.

Also, teachers selected to participate will receive a stipend of $500. Stipends are intended to help cover ordinary living expenses (including lodging and meals), some books, and travel expenses to and from the workshop location.

Travel supplements primarily for those traveling long distances will be allocated, on a case-by-case basis, after participants are selected and will be made available at the time of the workshop or shortly thereafter. This additional travel allowance is intended to help defray the cost of air travel, but will not cover the full cost. Stipends and travel supplements are taxable.

Participants are required to attend all scheduled sessions and to engage fully in all workshop activities. Participants who, for any reason, do not complete the full tenure of the project must refund a pro-rata portion of their stipend.

A small number of faculty housing (either studio or one-bedroom units with kitchen, private bath, and cable TV) and special-rate rooms at the Hilton Hawaiian Village, Doubletree Alana, and Waikiki Marriott will be available to participants on a space-available basis. Rates for the faculty housing with private bath facilities range from $35 (for studio) to $48 (for one bedroom with kitchen) per night, based on availability. Rates for the hotel rooms range from $119 to $169 per night, depending on availability.

The workshop will be led by Namji Steinemann, director of AsiaPacificEd Program, the East-West Center’s primary program for K-12 teachers; Geoffrey White, professor of anthropology and senior fellow at the East-West Center; and Daniel Martinez, National Park Service historian at the USS Arizona Memorial. This team brings together experience with developing programs for teaching Asia and the Pacific in U.S. schools (Steinemann), academic expertise on the representation of Pearl Harbor in American culture (White), and knowledge of Pearl Harbor history and of the Memorial as a national historic site (Martinez).

Also, project faculty have been recruited to represent the history of Pearl Harbor in the broader context of U.S.-Japan relations and the Pacific War (Peter Duus, Stanford University), in terms of American diversity and Japanese American experience (Gary Mukai, Stanford University), and in international perspectives (Yujin Yaguchi, Tokyo University and Japanese educators from various institutions/schools). In addition, two teacher-consultants will facilitate the development of classroom strategies and materials for teaching Pearl Harbor issues. This team will work jointly to offer a program that brings critical and informed perspectives on teaching Pearl Harbor as a landmark of American (and world) history and culture.