Vietnam War is History, Not Current
Events for U.S. Teens
By Maura Jane Farrelly
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Educator
Jim Cullen teaches 20th century U.S. history to high school
students at the Ethical Culture Fieldston School in Bronx,
New York
VOA
Photo |
New York (VOA)
— Historians in the United States have struggled for years to find
a fair and balanced way to teach students about the Vietnam War
– and the atrocities committed there by U.S. soldiers. But on this
30th anniversary of the American pullout from Saigon, objectivity
may no longer be the greatest challenge facing teachers.
That
is the verdict of Jim Cullen, who teaches 16 and 17-year-old students
at the Ethical Culture Fieldston School – a private academy in
Bronx, New York. He specializes in 20th-Century U.S. History,
and so a significant part of his course focuses on the Vietnam
War.
Mr.
Cullen says 17 years ago, when he first began teaching, it was
difficult to talk to students about this war, because many of
their parents had either served in the conflict, or else were
active in the protests against it. But nowadays, the war has become
a thing of the past for most students and most parents. "In
a way, I have less of a challenge, because it’s moved more decisively
into their own history for these students," Mr. Cullen says.
"I think most of the people I deal with are aware of the
Vietnam War, are aware of it as a divisive war, but themselves
don’t have much of a stake in it."
Well
into the 1980s, the rancor surrounding the Vietnam War was evident
in American popular culture. Songs like Bruce Springsteen’s "Born
in the U.S.A." and movies like Oliver Stone’s "Born
on the Fourth of July" were popular with American teenagers
– who had been just toddlers when the United States pulled out
of Saigon in April 1975.
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Ethical
Culture Fieldston School on a spring day.
VOA
Photo |
But
today’s teenagers do not hear much about Vietnam in popular culture,
and so Jim Cullen says the challenge for him, as a teacher, is
not so much to find a fair and balanced way to tell the story
– as it is to find a compelling way to tell it. "One of the
things about the Vietnam War is that it’s very well documented
in contemporary media," he says. "I can show them, as
I often do, the CNN documentary on Vietnam, and that documentary
has things that you would not see in war today. I mean, you have
correspondents talking to soldiers in the middle of battles, and
[these soldiers are] expressing their bitterness. And so there
is a sense in which these kids can sort of see it for themselves."
Jim Cullen has his students read personal narratives about the
conflict – such as Arizona Senator John McCain’s account of the
5 1/2 years he spent as a prisoner of war in Hanoi. "I think
McCain is a very good example for a couple of reasons. First of
all, he’s a person in contemporary politics that students can
connect with," he says. "Also, his story is so dramatic,
and it reminds us of things like ‘courage’ and ‘honor’- words
that have largely disappeared from the American vernacular, in
measure because of the Vietnam War, and the sense of cynicism
that the war engendered."
That
cynicism may be the war’s greatest legacy – affecting people who
were born long after the conflict was over. Julia Selzer, 17,
says she has no personal connection to the Vietnam War, but that
she and her contemporaries are definitely cynics. "I think
that can be seen in the younger generation’s responses to the
Iraqi War," Ms. Selzer says. "I mean, we were very cynical
about that, and I think for a good reason. And I think the Vietnam
War really showed what kind of power the government has to affect
all of our citizens, and how much war really affects our country."
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Josh
Egendorf, son of a Vietnam veteran and a high school student
at Ethical Culture Fieldston School in Bronx, New York
VOA
Photo |
But the cynicism
many young Americans feel does not necessarily get in the way of
pride. Just ask Josh Egendorf, 17 – one of a dwindling number of
teenagers in this country whose father is old enough to have served
in Vietnam. "I actually felt kind of proud about (my father’s
service), in a way that my dad had experienced the pains of the
world," he says. "He’s very knowledgeable about that kind
of thing, and he’s a serious man. So I felt kind of proud of him,
but also I felt bad for the times that he spent in agony after the
war. But it’s a point of pride in my life that my dad took part
in that."
As
the years pass, there will be fewer and fewer students like Josh
Egendorf – until one day, even the people teaching the history
of the Vietnam War will not have a personal connection to it.
And when that happens, teacher Jim Cullen says, documentaries
and personal narratives will be even more important than they
are today, because without them, the Vietnam War could go the
way of the Mexican War – a bloody, mid-19th century conflict that
was provoked by territorial greed… condemned by such notable
thinkers as Abraham Lincoln and Henry David Thoreau… and
is today largely unknown to Americans.