Teacher showing photos to kids of victorian dead children - slightly disturbing

[whyiwonderwhy]

I am finding this so disturbing I can't sleep! However I might be being oversensitive, who knows. It is the "but - WHY?" bit which is bothering me most.

The lesson was about the industrial revolution, and the subject of photography came up, 2 of the earliest photos were shown to the class (13-14yo) and then....I wish I could say the teacher showed photos of some of the extraordinary engineering inventions of the day, or of busy streets, or China, or something wonderful and extraordinary...but no, the teacher showed 10 photos of dead children and talked about how the Victorians would photograph dead children as though they were still alive, with the rest of the family, in a commemorative way. I have seen some in the past (I didn't learn about it at school however) and they are moving and tragic and disturbing. Nothing else, just these photos.

Just wondering...why? why would the teacher do this? Any ideas?

This teacher has form by the way. A lot of it. But this has for some reason blindsided me.

if it makes you feel any better, OP, a lot of the viral victorian 'death photography' examples are actually photos of live people misrepresented as dead. if the person is sat up or stood with no or minimal support, they're undoubtedly alive. a dead body is extremely floppy and requires a great deal of strength to be held up.

It's all interlinked - you can't teach the Industrial Revolution properly without looking at society at the time, and this is part of it.

Contextualisation is vital to developing the level of understanding required.

And understanding the Victorians is also part of the English GCSE - it's impossible to analyse at 19th century literature effectively without it - including attitudes to death. The subjects interlink. Holistic education.

But hey, teachers clearly have no clue what they are doing, or why. They just chuck in anything they fancy.

Thanks!

Thank you! I don’t find either practice odd or disturbing. I was just pointing out that the victorians were no different than modern folk.

It isn't this which bothers me, but just to answer, basically they were held up by people behind a curtain, or they were "arranged" as sort of lounging, or they had wooden props holding them up. You can see the devastation on the faces of the members of the family who are alive, it is quite moving, and I am sure the photos intended to be a tribute to love not to be morbid.

Are you saying that you think that studying these specific photos is written into the curriculum?

If so, you may want to double check as I don't think that that is right.

To be fair, i think it has potentially a place in history class, but one on victorian attitudes to death, which is interesting in itself, and not in the industrial revolution class. So I sort of agree with you....

@whyiwonderwhy, it doesn't seem that you have really taken in the many explanations of why this could have been a powerful lens to begin a discussion about all the other things which, in your estimation, were the more "important bits" of this period. Instead, you agree only with people who entirely affirm your opinion. Have you read books like historian (and Harvard President) Drew Faust's This Republic of Suffering, which won a Pulitzer Prize? Or Tom Laqueur's, Helen Fawcett Professor of History at Princeton's book, The Work of the Dead? I don't think you are understanding how powerful this topic is to understand this whole period. And what a compelling way it offers to being a broader discussion.

Yeah morticians have debunked this - dead weight isn't something you can 'prop up' from behind a curtain, and cetainly not with a flimsy wooden frame. Adult corpses especially are heavy and unwieldy. Some of them are dead, but only the 'lounging' ones, and more likely children and babies as their bodies are lighter. All fascinating stuff! VIctorian death practises are a big interest of mine

Do you think this also may have come about partly due to the pope dying and people taking photos and the discussion on that, so showing the differences and similarities to today.

If you can’t sleep because of this, then you need help.

The books you mention are interesting but they are special interest subjects. History should be taught giving a broad base level of knowledge first, and then specialising gradually, gradually narrow your field of study/specialised interests. A "powerful lens" is the wrong way round for children. They need the basic knowledge, the structure of the subject, the foundations, first.

The photos I have seen are mostly very little children being propped up or held up. The older children and adults were all sitting or "lounging", with eyes open, as though alive.

Says who? Sounds like bollocks to me. The human details can often be a good way in to the broader ideas.

If you make it big deal, it will be a big deal to your kids, so don't.

Actually, i am really tired now, I will probably sleep like a rock - and I need to be up really early so I am thinking I should probably bow out.

Bloody goths!

As far as I know, if you want your dc to be able to pass exams well all the way up through degree level and to have a good grasp of historical context on present day world affairs, what I said was right, but just to clarify that human details are also needed as part of the base knowledge.

The specialist subjects (human details or otherwise) are very interesting too. Not knocking them. But they are probably even more interesting once you have context from the wider base knowledge.

I'm sure the teacher will cover the curriculum. I don't think it's up to parents to dictate the content of one individual lesson. That's rather controlling. You weren't in the lesson to know exactly what was covered. I guess you could submit detailed lesson plans for how you think each topic should be covered if you wanted to share your expertise though.

Thank you to everyone. I am off to bed now, feeling much calmer, this thread was very therapeutic!

But child mortality was a huge issue during the Victorian era. Public health systems were either entirely lacking or woefully inadequate. Children particularly in the industrial towns and cities were being employed in incredibly dangerous jobs: chimney sweeps, clearing fallen cotton from beneath looms in textile factories, down in the coal mines, etc.

They were often living in squalid conditions in overcrowded tenements, malnourished and contending with poor sanitation and often inadequate infrastructure, resulting in awful and deadly events such as cholera outbreaks from contaminated water pumps (the Broad Street Pump outbreak in London killed over 600 people). And that’s assuming they weren’t especially unlucky and were in the workhouse.

It might seem morbid, but I think it’s an important aspect of that era for children to understand. So many children didn’t make it to adulthood, mainly due to the limitations in science and modern medicine (no vaccination programmes for childhood diseases in those days), hence the Victorians taking those commemorative photos. Today’s children will benefit greatly from understanding how very lucky they are to have been born when they have been.

This IS part of that "broad base" 🤦🏼‍♀️🤦🏼‍♀️🤦🏼‍♀️.

whyiwonderwhy · Today 00:02

mmsnet · Today 00:00
its part ot victorian history, get over yourself

right back at you, my lovely

FFS. This response, so nasty and pointless, shocked me far more than any suggestion of ghoulishness on the part of the teacher.

Whyiwonderwhy

You are an unpleasant piece of work. Ever tried to engage kids of that age in history? No? Thought not.
When I was teaching Latin at a prep school and DH (ex-Royal Navy, delightful avuncular figure for the boarders) ran a Roman Legion, he taught them how to kill people with a gladius.(stick it between the ribs, pull it out and listen for the sucking noise) He re-enacted Roman battles, all good boys-own stuff, the kids made armour and functioning ballistae, carried out operations against the barbarians in the woods after dark, camp fires, route marches ... He was adored by the kids, who were inspired to carry on their fascination with Roman culture. The parents thought it was absolutely wonderful, too.
Oh, and we took them to Rome. For the day. Wearing their uniforms which I had had printed for them. Walking down the Via Corso, some carabinieri saw them coming, nudged each other, snapped to attention and presented arms. The little boys were walking half a metre above the pavement.

All this fucking clutching of pearls among these precious, ignorant parents.

Yep - get over yourself.

I saw graphic car crash live films as required in driver education class.
I was grossed out and they didn’t make me drive any more defensively.
My dad yelling at me worked like a charm.

Learning needs to be memorable. that lesson was memorable