Carved in Stone: Teaching World War II through Monuments and Memorials

Dr. Christopher Hamner, Associate Professor of History, George Mason University and Understanding Sacrifice Lead Historian, will lead a two-part session during the workshop. First, he will discuss how he approaches working with the teachers during the professional development workshops, modeling various techniques of close reading of World War II primary sources that he uses during online seminars. Using the skills developed during the close-reading--sourcing, context, multiple perspectives, and using evidence to support claims-- Dr. Hamner will then introduce how one can transfer the skills used in close-reading of primary sources to close-readings of monuments and memorials.

The group will then travel to the National World War II Memorial on the National Mall where Dr. Hamner will lead the group through a close-reading of the Memorial, focusing on the concepts of war, memory, and memorialization. Teachers will examine the monument itself, learn more about the process of its design, and consider what the specifics of the memorial’s design can tell us about how Americans chose to commemorate the conflict a half-century after its conclusion.