Partnership Programs: American Revolution Native American Series Southeast Asian Tour STEMTEC Teachers as Scholars Witness for Freedom American Revolution: Resources {Books, lesson plans, links, videos, and more} Evaluations {Read what the participants have to say about each session.} "To Form a More Perfect Union" (PDF) Read the article printed in Five College Ink magazine about the series (PDF files require Adobe Acrobat Reader 4.0 to view. Download free program) Participants (are from the four collaborating districts, which include Belchertown, Holyoke, Mohawk Trail and Hampshire Regional). Judith Atwood, Peck Middle School James Cannon, Dean Technical Voc. High School Leny Jo Captein, Belchertown High School Joe Coll, Hawlemont Regional Elementary School Lynn Dole, Mohawk Trail Regional High School Patricia Dostie-Hounshell, Lynch Middle School Dana Geis, Lynch Middle School Robert Hansbury, Belchertown High School Jerry Hoyt, Mohawk Trail Regional High School Edward O'Malley, Dean Technical Voc. High School Helene Pajak, Westhampton Elementary School Tracey Pinkham, Hampshire Regional Middle School Steven Shepherd, Swift River Elementary School Jane Shaney, Mohawk Trail Regional High School Jason Woodcock, Belchertown High School   Theme: The Many Struggles for Citizenship, 1740-1840 Faculty: Joyce Berkman, University of Massachusetts The Declaration of Independence states that governments derive their just powers "from the consent of the governed." This radical concept repudiates the traditional idea of civic identity as rooted in one's allegiance to the political ruler under whom one was born. Presumably, the new and non-traditional Republic would establish one's nationality and citizenship based upon one's consent, rather than on accident of birth. But this was not to be. From 1776 to the present, controversies have raged over the meaning of national and civic identity and citizenship, over the rights and obligations of citizens, and over who qualifies as a full citizen. Ambiguous and exclusionary features of the US Constitution limited the range of citizenship, spurring a multitude of court cases and Amendments to the Constitution. Today we still have not resolved the legal status of foreign immigrants, the offspring of illegal immigrants, and the precise rights and obligations of women. The citizenship rights of native born people of color continue precarious. The session on Citizenship will focus on contradictions in the assumptions and arguments of leaders of the American Revolution and the framers of the Constitution regarding nationality and citizenship. What are the sources of late eighteenth-century confusion over a person's nationality and civic status? Why did this confusion prevail? Why did social class, race and gender become contested axes of citizenship rights and obligations? How did confusion over civic identity and ideals become manifest during the Revolution's aftermath and eventually within the Constitution? What is the legacy of this confusion? We will look at specific court cases, e.g. Martin vs. Massachusetts (1805) that disqualified women from independent civic identity, a decision that historian Linda K. Kerber does not view as inevitable. Is she correct? · Warm-up: how issues of citizenship arise in our lives, e.g., our receiving a notice of compulsory jury duty. · In lecture format, an overview of the scholarship and its findings on US citizenship and its relationship to issues of nationality, gender, race, social class. · Small groups: (a) examination of Primary Sources, e.g. key articles of the Constitution, selected antebellum court cases, iconography of active citizenship, diary accounts and letters. · Small groups discuss how questions of US citizenship enter into their current teaching of history and social studies. They will compare their current classroom approaches to these questions and consider as a result of their readings and the morning's discussion what changes that they will try to adopt in the future. (Reading List April 6, 2002) Gundersen, Joan R., "Independence, Citizenship, and the American Revolution" Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, Vol. 13, No. 1 (University of Chicago, 1987), pp.59-77. Kerber, Linda K., "The Paradox of Women's Citizenship in the Early Republic: The Case of Martin vs. Massachusetts, 1805", American Historical Review, April, 1992 pp. 349-378. Kerber, Linda K., "A Constitutional Right to be Treated Like American Ladies: Women and the Obligations of Citizenship" U.S. History as Women's History, (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1995) pp17-35.