History and Memory:
The Mongol Invasions
of Japan
© 2014 Program for Teaching East Asia, University of Colorado
“All history, even ancient history is contemporary
history because each generation and group
rewrites that history in the light of their own
values, perspectives, experiences and
concerns….Memory can be a slippery source…The
question for the historian is: What is the value
of…a historical source? It is a question that
different historians will answer differently. Those
answers will shape their histories in different
molds, creating a clash of historical
interpretations….”
—Historian Peter Winn
From “History and Memory,” Bridging World History, Annenberg Foundation, 2013,
http://www.learner.org/courses/worldhistory/unit_transcript_2.html.
What do you know
about the Mongol
invasions of
Japan?
Detail from 19th-century version of “Takezaki Suenaga’s Scrolls of the Mongol Invasions
of Japan,” Bowdoin College, http://www.bowdoin.edu/mongol-scrolls/.