Entertaining is Easy, Educating is Harder
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Entertaining is Easy, Educating is Harder James V. Shuls
Accepted: 28 July 2020 / # The National Association of Scholars 2020
My wife says I’m obsessed. I don’t really agree, but I am enthralled. Since Hamilton was released on Disney Plus, I have watched or listened to it four times (and I’ve already started it again). Yet, I’m also dismayed at the reaction to Hamilton. No, I don’t mean at the outrage mob seeking to “cancel” the production because of some of the historical figure’s less savory actions or views. I’m dismayed when folks say something like, “If history had been taught like this when I was in school, I might have gotten more out of it.” If George Washington was here (the Hamilton version), what would he say to that? I imagine it would echo this musical refrain, “Entertaining is easy, young man. Educating is harder.” I do not mean from the perspective of the entertainer. It reportedly took Lin Manuel Miranda six years to write Hamilton. No, I mean from the perspective of the one being entertained or educated. Being entertained is passive. It requires us to sit, relax, and enjoy. The entertainers do all of the hard work. Education is not this way. You cannot passively become educated; indoctrinated maybe, but not educated. Take Hamilton for instance. Hamilton was made to entertain, and it has been wildly successful at that. And though you can learn some things from the production, if you consume this entertainment as if you were receiving an education you will unknowingly walk away with some falsities. For instance, after viewing Hamilton, one might get the impression that the creation of a central bank was a stroke of genius that even Thomas Jefferson and
James V. Shuls , Ph.D., is an associate professor and the department chair of Educator Preparation and Leadership at the University of Missouri-St. Louis.
J. Shuls
James Madison grew to appreciate. This take downplays the significant debate that Hamilton and Jefferson were taking part in and that rages to this day—the limits of constitutional authority. In his rhetorical rhyming during the first cabinet meeting of the production, Jefferson’s arguments against the bank all seem self-serving and parochial. He opposes a national bank because the slave state Virginia doesn’t have debt and he sees a national bank as a way to situate power in New York City. Never once does the Hamilton Jefferson bring up his strict interpretation of the limits of constitutional power. Secondly, Hamilton would let the viewer believe that Hamilton’s national bank was ultimately widely accepted. In fact, Congress failed to renew the bank’s twenty year charter in 1811. Vice President George Clinton, a long-time Hamilton foe and former governor of New York, cast the deciding vote against the bank. In the end, Hamilton’s machinations in New York politics may have undermined the existence of the very thing he is credited with creating. To the uneducated, these may seem like minor nuances that can easily be explained away by the artistic license given to entertainers. Yet, the
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