This interactive panel shares how biography can serve as a compelling method and unit of analysis for world history instruction and research. By nature, world history tends to stress broad patterns over time: comparison and periodization are among the trusty methods for navigating the centuries and steering towards specific themes. But “Up Close and Personal” focuses in on select, less familiar stories of individuals, whose lives have shaped and reflected local, regional, and global processes and context. We examine how biographies, and in particular biographies of women, cut through time to highlight agency and clarify parts of broader narratives. We share how such work offers timely content and pulls double-duty as historiographical exercises in the classroom.

Four presenters will point to how biography can amplify world-historical research and also be put to specific use in the classroom. Drawing from case studies in Latin American, North American, and East Asian history, all link to global processes and turning points. Suzanne Litrel addresses how women in Brazilian history can help frame and highlight Brazil in the Atlantic world and beyond. She investigates how once-slave Chica da Silva and Leopoldina, Habsburg Princess-turned-empress of Brazil, have been written into and out of state and world history and demonstrates how their stories can drive discussion of Brazil in Atlantic and world history. Rick Warner examines transnational activism of nineteenth-century Argentinian educator and Juana Paula Manso, whose efforts in educational reform extended well beyond Latin America. Maryanne Rhett traces the efforts of early 20th century women cartoonists. They shaped global feminist discourse not only through their graphic art but also by their participation in the male-dominated world of cartooning. Candice Goucher examines the common concern with why individuals matter from a world history perspective and links the relationships between the individual and broader patterns to the past, using the biographies of women social reformers, soldiers, and peace activists in the twentieth century.

By getting “up close and personal,” biography not only drives researchers to follow and contextualize subjects and their stories, but hooks students on history and encourages them to explore the individual from a global perspective. To that end, several panelists will also share and model how biography can shape or drive a lesson, lecture, or unit of instruction. Each such suggestion will offer classroom-specific ideas, including options for remote, flipped, or in-person courses.