Teaching

In Perkiss’ classes, she guides students through thinking about the processes of change-making, the evolution of ideas and actions, and the ways in which context, perspective, and evidence shape our understanding of the human predicament. She asks them to look at history as a series of deliberate decisions by individuals and the intended and unintended consequences that emerge as a result of those decisions. She wants students to leave each semester with an understanding that the world in which they live was not a naturally occurring enterprise. In her classes, to study history is to recognize that the present was not an inevitability.