Jayne Bisman
CHARLES STURT UNIVERSITY

MAKING ACCOUNTING HISTORIANS

Abstract: This paper addresses the question of how accounting educators can “make” accounting historians or, more precisely, how educators can assist in fostering the development of historically aware accounting academics and practitioners. Various approaches to accounting history education are outlined, situated within the context of efforts to boost the membership of the community of accounting history scholars, redress deficiencies in accounting education, and engender the development of competent and broadly educated practicing professionals. The contributions and benefits of incorporating accounting history into accounting programs are overviewed, including an outline of past and contemporary examples of applications of accounting history in educational practice. A case study of the design and modeling of a graduate course in accounting history is then discussed and is offered as a prototype for use or adaptation by accounting educators interested in harnessing the potential of studies in accounting history to improve student learning experiences and learning outcomes.

INTRODUCTION

A brief overview of the table of contents in successive issues of the most notable journals publishing studies of accounting’s past, such as the Accounting Historians Journal, Accounting History, and Accounting, Business & Financial History, reveals something of the numbers of participants in, and extent of, the accounting history community, given the frequent recurrence of a relatively select few authors. An understanding of the profiles and publishing histories of these academics indicates that the accounting history community is currently composed of a largely mature faculty and these scholars “periodically express
Acknowledgments: The author is especially grateful for feedback and advice on this paper received from Professors Christopher Napier, Garry Carnegie, and Brian West; Drs. Margaret Lightbody and Carolyn Fowler; and participants at the First Accounting History Symposium (2008) and the Charles Sturt University Accounting Research Forum. The positive comments and suggestions of the two anonymous reviewers are also gratefully acknowledged.

concerns about the ageing” of their community [Guthrie and Parker, 2006, p. 8]. While Carnegie and Rodrigues [2007] and Guthrie and Parker [2006] provide evidence that accounting historians comprise a strong and flourishing group on a global basis, Fleischman and Radcliffe [2005, p. 85] characterize the U.S. segment of this community as experiencing “precipitous decline” [see also, Radcliffe, 2006]. Nevertheless, all of these commentators agree that attracting new, younger faculty to the community is a priority, and effort needs to be devoted to developing mechanisms to encourage and support the next and future generations of accounting history scholars. One means for doing so is through the work of various accounting history societies [Previts et al., 1990; Guthrie and Parker, 2006; Carnegie and Rodrigues, 2007], while another complementary avenue for encouraging interest in accounting history and the continued proliferation of historical accounting research, is through accounting history education.

In addition to bringing further academics into the fold, accounting history education has the potential to provide a range of other benefits. These benefits include promising opportunities for redressing deficiencies in accounting education programs in relation to content mastery, development of generic skills, and the quality of student learning experiences. More positively, opportunities exist for producing more well-rounded, informed, and critically aware accounting practitioners who are instilled with a sense of the importance and relevance of the history of their discipline to contemporary practice. In addressing these priorities, and noting Previts et al.’s [1990, p. 3] concern that there is a paucity of information about the place of accounting history within accounting pedagogy and “instruction in accounting history” and the more recent observation that there remain genuine weaknesses in “integrating accounting history into the curriculum” [Richardson, 2008, p. 268], the current paper provides a review of accounting history in accounting educa-tion and a discussion and modeling of the design of a graduate course1 in accounting history.

The remainder of this paper is presented in three sections. The following section examines the literature concerning the role of accounting history in accounting education. This review

‘A “course” is a teaching segment that is generally offered on a term or se-mester-long basis, alternatively called a subject, unit, or paper, as distinct from a program which represents a series of courses leading to an academic award such as a degree.

provides a context for the discussion of course design detailed in the next section. The final section of the paper offers some concluding comments concerning directions in accounting his-tory education, potential applications of the course development blueprint, and suggestions for further research on the interface of accounting history and accounting education.

ACCOUNTING HISTORY AND ACCOUNTING EDUCATION

Concerns were raised about deficiencies in the state of accounting education by academics, professional accounting bodies, and employer groups during the 1980s and 1990s in many English-speaking nations. At issue was the belief that accounting students possessed a myopic view of their discipline which lacked grounding in, and was unrelated to, broader business, economic, and social phenomena. This belief prompted professional bodies to press educational institutions to include a wider range of both business-related and non-business courses in their curricula and to increase the attention paid to the development of students’ generic competencies [NZSA, 1984; AAA, 1986; AECC, 1990; ICAEW, 1993; JARTF, 1995; Paisey and Paisey, 2006]. From the perspective of accounting educators, the movement for accounting education change meant that “to foster lifelong learning, accounting teachers should focus on developing critical thinking skills, creating a climate of inquiry, encouraging divergent thinking, providing feedback, focusing on process not content, and designing evaluations that reflect higher order problem solving” [Doney et al., 1993, p. 297].

There is a body of work that spans many decades concerning the desirability of including accounting history in undergraduate and graduate programs in order to improve student learning experiences and learning outcomes. Zeff [1989, p. 204] suggested that “above all, a historical perspective is essential” in securing the essence of a liberal and broad-based education in accounting. In the mid-1980s, a committee of the American Accounting Association [AAA, 1986, p. 183] recommended that accounting programs include content concerning the “history of accounting and its role as an information system in society.” Other reports, such as those of the large public accounting firms [Arthur Andersen et al., 1989] and the Accounting Education Change Commission [AECC, 1990], also advocated that accounting programs feature the history of the accounting profession and the history of accounting thought [Coffman et al., 1993]. In light of such reports, and echoing Zeff [1989], Koeppen [1990,

pp. 89, 95] suggested that providing “students with a historical perspective of the events which have shaped the practice of accountancy” represents a major approach to educating, rather than merely training accountants, as well as inculcating an understanding and appreciation of “accounting culture.” Similarly, Flegm [1991, p. 355] held that teaching curricula should be broadened to include accounting history to enable students to evaluate and contribute to change in accounting practice. Other key academics have also pushed for accounting history to be taught as a regular component of accounting programs [Greenwood, 1997, p. 13].

More recently, the IFAC [2003, p. 46] promulgated International Education Standards for Professional Accountants which specifies that an accounting degree should include “history of the accountancy profession and accounting thought.” Many national accounting program accrediting bodies, such as those in the U.S., the U.K., Canada, and Australia, have an obligation as members of the IFAC to uphold and comply with these requirements [ICAA and CPA Australia, 2008, p. 3].
In relating accounting history to accounting practice in light of the fallout from the Enron collapse, Amernic and Craig [2004, p. 344] argued that:
Current critics and commentators…are reminded that recent indictments of accounting, and some of the re-forms suggested, are deja vu, and have been ignored by accountants and accounting educators for decades. We cite some examples of these criticisms and invoke them as part of an appeal for greater regard to be accorded the study of accounting history.

The content knowledge and skills set developed or enhanced by studying accounting history has broad applicability and is eminently relevant within the climate of accounting education reform previously outlined, as well as in response to the con-cerns about accounting, audit, and corporate scandal identified by Amernic and Craig [2004; see also, Flesher, quoted in Hahn, 2006]. Accounting history education has the potential to improve students’ technical skills; appreciation of alternative theoretical perspectives, paradigms, and arguments; and understandings of the rationales, underpinnings, and evolution of historical and contemporary practices. Such study can build not only knowledge of accounting’s past, present, and future [Carnegie and Napier, 1996] and provide insight into the interplay of accounting with other discipline areas [Garner, 1974], but also enhance students’ generic competencies in communicating, critical thinking, analysis, social and cultural awareness, and ethics [Koeppen, 1990; Ainsworth, 2001; Samson et al., 2006].

However, despite the professed benefits, calls to incorporate studies in accounting history into accounting programs do not seem to have generated significant developments in educational praxis in English-speaking nations, although accounting history education may have a higher profile in a number of European countries, such as Italy and Spain. Several research projects utilizing survey questionnaires have been conducted to elicit views on the need for accounting history education, particularly in the U.S., and have produced mixed results. A study conducted in the mid-1970s [WSUARS, 1978, p. 64] examined the perceptions of educators and public, corporate, and government practitioners (n=577), finding that these “accountants became more sensitive to the importance of accounting history as they reach senior levels in their careers” and “accounting educators expect accounting history to be significantly more important in ten years than it is today.” Several years later, a survey [Van Fleet and Wren, 1982, p. 112] of members (n=294) of the American Assembly of Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) and the Business History Conference revealed that while accounting, business, and/or economic history was included in the educational programs of an overwhelming number of respondent institutions, it was “usually taught as part of a course or courses rather than as one or more separate courses.” In a more contemporary survey, Slocum and Sriram [2001, p. 113] investigated academics’ (n=377) perceptions about whether calls for change in the accounting curriculum had been translated into additional “accounting courses with a predominant history content in U.S. business schools.” The researchers found that of 216 institutions, only two offered an accounting course with a history focus at the undergraduate level, 11 did so at the masters level, and seven at the doctoral level. The authors concluded that the number of accounting history courses had declined across the 1985 to 1997 period and that the results failed to indicate a commitment by institutions to implement the recommendations of the AECC and others active in promoting change in accounting education. Williams and Schwartz [2002] surveyed accounting faculty in AACSB-accredited schools (n=45), finding that, in general, faculty disagreed with the notion that undergraduate students should study a separate course in accounting history. While there was relatively weak agreement that accounting history should be part of the introductory financial accounting course, respondents did not support the contentions that this would attract more business students to the accounting major, improve the relevance of accounting topics, or make learning accounting more interesting.

These diverse research results indicate significant differ-ences between recommendations and forecasts concerning ac-counting history education compared to actual developments in educational practice over time. There is also scant extant literature that provides guidance for addressing the issue of how to incorporate study of accounting’s past into existing curricula, much less how to devise a dedicated accounting history course. Consequently, the main thrust of the current paper is to provide guidance in meeting these goals through the lens offered by dis-cussion of a detailed and tangible illustration from practice.
There are several strategies with potential for bridging the divide between calls for accounting history education and action in implementing educational initiatives, with the most obvious being to feature aspects of accounting history in existing accounting courses at the undergraduate [University of Wyoming, 2005] and graduate levels. To an extent, this is already happening in many institutions internationally although in some it may well be that accounting history is dealt with “only by way of anecdotes” and as an “incidental” aspect of courses [Previts et al., 1990, p. 3]. However, several academics have published case studies on using particular historical accounting artifacts, books, or research publications as teaching and learning resources in introductory accounting, financial accounting, accounting theory, and auditing courses. Examples of these include utilization of:

• Pacioli’s treatise for informing classroom instruction [Sangster et al., 2007];

• Hammond’s [2002] book, A White Collar Profession: African-American CPAs Since 1921, in encouraging the development of generic skills and understanding
of diversity issues in the profession [Samson et al., 2006];

• account books from the 18th and 19th centuries for providing interdisciplinary instruction and aiding in the understanding of accounting concepts [Bloom
and Solotko, 2005];

• historical annual reports in building technical skills and reinforcing the idea that “accounting evolves in response to environmental change” [Amernic and
Elitzur, 1992, p. 29];

• histories of accounting firms to improve understand ing of both subject matter and the history of the pro fession [Simon, 1995];

• medieval statements in revealing how accounting in any era is related to the social and economic institutions of the period [Piaker, 1972];

• historical and contemporary audits in teaching governmental accounting and the evolution of accounting thought [Ariail et al., 2008];

• adversarial roleplays based on Paton’s submission to a U.S. Wage Stabilization Board hearing as a basis for stimulating learning in accounting theory [Craig
and Greinke, 1994]; and

• accounting history research articles, biographies, and videos in encouraging constructive thinking, conceptualization, and understanding of financial account
ing and of the manner in which changing environments produce behavioral responses [Coffman et al., 1993; Previts et al., 2006].

Nevertheless, these examples may be exceptional within the wider sweep of accounting education since, as Simon [1995, p. 1] notes, “in most curricula, little or no attention is paid to history in financial accounting, cost accounting, or auditing classes.” Further, in discussing the incorporation of accounting history into other accounting courses, Deinzer [1965, p. 1] drew a Gestaltian conclusion in warning that “the characteristics of a whole may not be shared by parts of the whole.

In addressing Deinzer’s [1965] cautionary note, another course of action is to pursue, with renewed vigor, the inclusion of a dedicated accounting history course in undergraduate programs [Napier, 1983; Greenwood, 1997]. While Albrecht and Sack [2000, pp. 46-47] concluded that accounting history featured among the courses which had been added to curricula in U.S. universities across the period from 1990 to 2000, and thus some change appears to have occurred, the inclusion of such courses is problematic due to long-held concerns that the curriculum in bachelor degree programs is already overcrowded [e.g., Peragallo, 1974; Mathews, 1991; Williams and Schwartz, 2002]. Interestingly, Albrecht and Sack [2000, p. 46] classified accounting history courses as “content-type adding,” as opposed to “broadening type [skills development] adding,” which is at odds with the views of a number of commentators on the role of accounting history in the curriculum in providing a broader educational perspective and enhancement of students’ generic competencies.

A further alternative is to include studies of accounting history as part of the doctoral degree [Fleischman et al., 2003; Flesher, 2004]. Despite Homburger’s [1958, p. 503] observation of half a century ago that in the U.S., “the course in accounting history is now fairly well established as an essential part of the graduate curriculum in accounting,” later commentators have suggested a paucity of attention to such studies in American doctoral programs [Previts et al., 1990, p. 3]. While the study of an accounting history course is possible to the extent that doc-toral programs, particularly those in the U.S,, have a seminar or course-work component, many British, mainland European, and Australian doctoral programs are by thesis only and do not include course work. As a result, attempts to generate interest in accounting history and encourage accounting history research may be foregone if not considered at an earlier stage. Consequently, another suggestion is to include accounting history as a course-work offering at the honors level [Forrester, 1976; Boys, 1980; University of Glasgow, 2007; University of Strathclyde, 2007; Victoria University of Wellington, 2007]. Finally, there is the option of a masters-level course in accounting history, an approach to the implementation of this strategy that is described in depth in the succeeding section of this paper.

MODELING A COURSE IN ACCOUNTING HISTORY

The current section describes and models the development of an accounting history course offered by an Australian uni-versity. The course, ACC536 Accounting and Business History, was launched in 2008 as a major new elective in the Master of Commerce Accounting (MCom(Acc)) degree program at Charles Sturt University (CSU). The degree serves a niche market of accounting graduates who are generally working full-time and opt to study on a part-time basis via distance education. CSU “was the first university in Australia to develop courses specifically with distance delivery in mind” [CSU, 2008] and has around 40,000 students, of which more than half study via distance mode [CSU, 2006]. The University’s MCom(Acc) program has been offered since the mid-1990s and can be completed by course work or course work with dissertation. The overall degree program is focused particularly on the theory-research-practice interface with an assessment regime that is largely unique for each student, emphasizing reflective and authentic learning activities within a student-centered, constructivist learning paradigm. The program has proven to be of increasing popularity not only with accounting practitioners, but also with accounting academics. Over 15% of graduates from the program have gone on to undertake doctoral studies in accounting.

Unlike most MBA programs, the CSU MCom(Acc) is classified as a specialist masters degree by the largest of the Australian professional accounting bodies [CPA Australia, 2007]. A competitive analysis revealed that ten2 of Australia’s 39 public and private universities offered a specialist masters as an add-on degree for accounting graduates which was genuinely equivalent to the CSU MCom(Acc). However, an examination of the courses within these programs showed that none of the institutions were currently offering a dedicated accounting history course. Similarly, searches conducted via the world-wide web failed to yield sufficiently detailed data on similar graduate courses offered by institutions overseas [e.g., the critical accounting history course, “Accounting Classics,” of the University of Strathclyde, 2007].

The initial development of the CSU Accounting and Business History course was based on the competitive analysis described above, a needs assessment involving consultation with past and current students in the MCom(Acc) program, consideration and review by course advisory panels, and the application of techniques and standards in curriculum mapping and instructional design. Such techniques had been successfully applied in the conceptualization and creation of other courses in the program in the past [Bisman, 2005, 2006, 2007c, 2007d]. Collectively, these development procedures resulted in support for a course in accounting history; the identification of a range of potential topics and approaches to the construction of the course materials; and rationales for determining the final orientation, content, and assessment regime to be adopted.

Course Orientation: The central tenet of the Accounting and Business History course is to present the area of accounting history as embedded within salient business, institutional, economic, social, and political contexts, recognizing the relationships of accounting and business history [see Fridenson, 2007] within a

2At the time the competitive analysis was conducted (2006 to 2007), publicly available information was obtained from university websites, university hand-books/calendars, and CPA Australia [2007], resulting in the identification of the following Australian universities that were offering, or had recently offered, a genuinely similar degree program: Curtin University of Technology, Griffith Uni-versity, Macquarie University, Monash University, University of Adelaide, Univer-sity of Melbourne, University of New England, University of Sydney, University of Western Sydney, and University of Wollongong.

framework to which accountants could readily relate and that would be relevant to their current professional practice. In dis-cussing the study of accounting history, Homburger [1958, pp. 501-502] claimed that:

To have meaning and purpose…the history course must be much more than a study of historical data. Even a mere comparison of past and present practices will not do. In approach and content the course must be designed to evaluate critically, by way of comparison, past and present theories and procedures in the light of the requirements set by the social and economic conditions of each period and each country. The primary objective of this approach must be the improvement of the professional competence and judgment of the modern accountant.

In line with this perspective, the idea of the ACC536 course was not to present a doctrinaire overview of the past, but rather to show how accounting history has shaped current accounting practice and to provide students with the knowledge and skills needed for making informed decisions about innovations and changes in practice. Thus, the course materials supplied to students specifically stress that such objectives are “primarily achieved through guiding you to the conclusion that accounting history is relevant to the real world today and that we can actually use knowledge of accounting history in better understanding, evaluating, criticising and improving modern accounting practice and policy” [Bisman, 2007b, p. 5]. Commencing from the position that accounting history is a pervasive force in contemporary accounting practice, the course materials make several points to illustrate how accounting history permeates the world of the modern accounting professional. For example, drawing insights from Parker [2001], the materials describe how most financial newspaper reports and journal articles in professional accounting magazines and the scholarly literature, as well as accounting standards and other technical and policy publications, regulations, and legislation, begin with a sketch of the background to an issue, providing a necessary historical context to underpin the discussion. Following Lee’s [1990] systematic outlook on the history of the domain of accounting, the introductory materials [Bisman, 2007b, p. 6] also make the point that:

In our professional lives as accountants our own history of personal experiences guides the way we behave, how we make decisions and how we carry out our work. The history of the organisations in which we work determines how those organisations function, the procedures adopted by the organisations, and how those organisations react to change. More broadly, the economic, social, political and cultural histories of the nations in which we live, and the governments which guide and oversee those nations, give rise to how communities, societies, and nations as a whole go about business and interact with one another.

In determining the content of the course, due recognition was given to Parker’s [1993, p. 106] contention that “accounting history is increasingly dominated by writers in English discussing private sector accounting in English-speaking countries of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries,” as well as Carmona’s [2004] findings which support this argument [see also, Walker, 2005]. Byway of contrast, the course [Bisman, 2007b, pp. 19-20] is presented as an inclusive, international sub-discipline area of accounting, featuring:

• a focus not only on accounting history in English-speaking nations and westernised cultures, but also on accounting in other nations, civilisations and cul tures;

• an examination of the roles of gender, race, and religion in accounting history;

• a consideration of history from ancient times through various historical eras, rather than solely concentrated on developments in accounting which occurred in the 19th and 20th centuries; and

• accounting history as it relates to the public sector as well as the private sector.

Course Structure, Delivery, and Content: Since the Accounting and Business History course is offered only by distance education, teaching delivery is via print-based course materials, supported by a range of online facilities and technology-mediated contact with teaching staff. The printed course materials consist of three components. The first component is a 20+ page “Subject Outline” which gives an introduction to the course and provides descriptions of teaching strategies, learning support, and administrative procedures. A 146-page “Study Guide,” detailed later in this section of the paper, facilitates students’ learning. A range of essential readings comprise the third component of the course materials. The online environment provides students with electronic versions of the “Subject Outline” and “Study Guide,” an online discussion forum and news board, and an electronic assessment submission facility, among other capabilities.

The course learning objectives [Bisman, 2007b, p. 3], appearing in the “Subject Outline,” highlight that upon successful completion of the course, students should be able to:

• outline the nature of historiography and the range of research methods relevant to historical study in accounting and business;
• enumerate and discuss differences between ‘old’ and ‘new’ accounting histories;
• chart the major developments in accounting thought and practice from ancient to contemporary times;
• demonstrate the essential skills to undertake and crit ically evaluate historical research in accounting and business; [and]
• discuss the relevance of, and apply historical findings to, modern accounting practice.

From these overall learning objectives, together with due consideration of the content of the eight topics in the course, a set of specific, task-oriented learning objectives for each topic is provided in the “Study Guide” as a means to delineate and formalize the nature of expected learning outcomes. The “Study Guide” also contains an extensive Commentary section written by the teaching convenor which discusses the context and content of each topic, highlights key issues, and provides further insights and information on the more problematic, controversial, or unusual aspects of particular topics. The Commentary also demonstrates how individual aspects of a topic, and different topics, fit together. The Commentary is designed to be used by students on an interactive basis and functions to facilitate and scaffold their learning, introducing the topic and including discussion interspersed with activities. Usually the first activity embedded within the Commentary will be a requirement for the student to read a particular paper provided in the study package. To encourage active reading, the next activity presented is generally a Study Task or Reflective Activity (several of which constitute the formal assessment items) requiring the student to construct and argue a case (see Appendix A).

The essential readings for the course are a diverse set derived from major journals which publish research on accounting’s past, together with selected chapters from relevant books. Examples of readings in the course appear in the following citations. The initial readings concern the study of history in general [Tosh, 2006] and the study of accounting history and historiography [Previts et al., 1990; Fleischman et al., 1996; Williams, 1999; Napier, 2001]. Other readings examine accountants, the profession, and professional bodies [Brown, 1905; Linn, 1996; Parker, 2005], and accounting in governments and public and private-sector organizations [Chatfield, 1968; Oldroyd, 1997; Nikitin, 2001; Anes, 2002; Jurado-Sanchez, 2002; Abeysekera, 2005; Carmona and Ezzamel, 2007]. The historical (and contemporary) relationships, influences, and interplay of accounting in respect to religion [Zaid, 2004]; gender, ethnicity, and culture [McKinnon, 1994; Hammond, 2003; Annisette, 2006]; and trade, business, and commerce are also represented [Brown and Johnston, 1963; Hale, 1978; Fleischman and Parker, 1992; Parker and Lewis, 1995; Flesher et al., 2003; Mussari and Mussari 2006]. Operating within the confines a single semester offering, it is not possible to do more than overview numerous of these areas; however, the readings, learning activities, and formal assessments provide the scope to illustrate the relevance of accounting’s past to the domain of the modern accounting profession. Further, the course goes beyond presenting a sterile and passive retrospective on accounting by challenging conceptions through the inclusion of confronting examples of accounting practices, such as accounting for slaves and reflections on the morality of these practices, introducing elements of critical pedagogy to the curriculum [Barney and Flesher, 1994; Fleischman et al., 2004; Fleischman, 2004; Tyson et al., 2004, 2005]. Students are also introduced to debate in the field, including the divide between “old” and “new” schools of thought on accounting historiography [Carnegie and Napier, 1996; Funnell, 1996; Fleischman, 2004], and alternative views on the interpretation and use of archival materials in accounting history research [e.g., McDonald, 2005, 2006; Hooper, 2006]. Examples are provided in the readings and “Study Guide” Commentary of works representing the areas of biography; micro-history; prosopography and institutional histories; social, political, and economic history; and critical histories, consistent with the goal of providing an holistic overview of topics in, and approaches to, accounting history.

The topics in the course could have been sequenced the-matically, by sub-discipline area, or according to geopolitical attributes; however, a chronological order was chosen as providing the most appropriate means to illustrate development and change in accounting over time and, in some cases, to demonstrate stagnation in accounting innovation, the recursive nature of particular techniques, or the reoccurrence of issues and events. The latter two points reflect Sterling’s contention that “accountants…don’t solve problems; we recycle them” [Sterling, quoted in Rutherford et al., 2001]. This structure also demonstrates to students how accounting is embedded within the broader social, political, and economic environments peculiar to specific eras. While each topic is presented as a separate and largely self-contained examination of accounting and business history within a particular epoch, links between crises and events across periods and the flow-though of techniques from one era to another are discussed in the readings and Commentary. The basic structure of the course is modeled in Figure 1.

As shown in Figure 1, the first topic in the course outlines fundamental considerations in history, historiography, and historical methods, emphasizing the importance of context in historical analysis and interpretation and introducing the role of accounting history in accounting education. This topic gives an overview of history as a disciplinary area of study and is designed to provide basic knowledge and skills, as well as supplying an architecture for the subsequent examination of specific topics in accounting history. In Topic 2, these themes are more closely aligned with accounting, including a survey of the philosophy, traditions and methods of analysis, and writing in accounting history. The third topic explores the rise of civilizations and governments, notions of quantification and counting, and the development of accounting practices in the ancient world. Topic 4 overviews accounting procedures in classical antiquity, arising from the advent of money in ancient Greece and the military machine and framework of laws and taxes developed within the Roman Empire.

Topic 5, covering the Middle Ages, focuses on manorial and “feudal” accounting in medieval Europe, although two of the six readings for this topic concern accounting practices of the period in other places and cultures. The next topic examines accounting in the Renaissance, focusing particularly on the rise of double-entry bookkeeping. Topics 7 and 8 are the largest, principally because of the range and pace of accounting developments occurring during the Industrial Revolution through the early 21 st century. The choice of themes to include in the final topic was particularly difficult. Among potential themes were accounting harmonization, social and environmental accounting, accounting and computerization, strategic management accounting, auditor independence, accounting ethics, and accounting and public-sector reform. However, none of these issues became particular features of the final topic in the course, in part because many of them are covered in other courses in the masters program. The themes ultimately selected were the development of professional accounting bodies and accounting standards, histories of corporate collapse and audit failure, and the influence of the scientific management move-ment on cost and management accounting. The final topic also provides observations on the recurrent nature of many of the challenges faced by the profession.

Historical Reasoning, Generic Skills, and Course Assessment: The student self-study activities and compulsory assessment items (samples of which are presented in the appendix) encompass each aspect of van Drie and van Boxtel’s [2008] framework for analyzing students’ historical reasoning as a means for in-forming educational practice (Figure 2). The authors note that, as distinct from mere historical literacy or historical conscious-ness, “historical reasoning emphasizes the activity of students and the fact that when learning history, students acquire not only knowledge of the past, but also use this knowledge for interpreting phenomena from the past and present” [van Drie and van Boxtel, 2008, p. 88, emphasis added]. Within the accounting history course, such reasoning, and the demonstration of that reasoning through the completion of study activities and formal assessments, also provides students with experience in applying and further developing a range of generic skills. The Study Tasks in the course focus on knowledge synthesis and critical evaluation, while Reflective Activities are more personalized, requiring students to reflect on practice and draw on their own prior learning and professional experiences. Since several of the Study Tasks and Reflective Activities ask for students’ ideas about parallels or distinctions between historical accounting practices and those of the modern day, students are also encouraged to source and use contemporary references when framing arguments.

suggests that evaluative rather than explanatory questioning improves historical reasoning and argument. Explanatory questioning requires students to offer an explanation as to why something occurred and can often result in students regurgitating the findings of the existing literature and proffering the arguments and opinions of others in providing that explication. Conversely, asking evaluative questions engages students in original thought, challenging them to develop their own commentary, assessment, opinions, and critical reflections, and, hence, to construct personalized meanings and understandings of phenomena. Reflective Activities 3.1, 6.2, and 6.5 (see Appendix A) are examples of evaluative questions used in the ACC536 course. In terms of the “use of sources” (Figure 2), Reflective Activity 3.3 and Study Task 5.3 (see Appendix A) require students to evaluate primary and secondary sources and assess the use made of those sources by established accounting historians. “Contextualiza-tion” is a particularly important concept stressed throughout the course. Learning exercises, such as Reflective Activity 4.4 and Study Task 7.4 (see Appendix A), engage students in considering historical contexts. “Argumentation” features in almost all of the Reflective Activities since these activities elicit reasoned opinions from students, such as in responding to Reflective Activities 2.1 and 8.7 (see Appendix A). “Use of substantive concepts” refers to “historical phenomena, structures, persons and periods” [van Drie and van Boxtel, 2008, pp. 99, 101], while “use of meta-concepts” relates to “the methods used by historians to investigate and describe historical processes and periods.” Substantive concepts are explained throughout the course “Study Guide.” For example, in the Commentary for Topic 5, the period constituting the early Middle Ages is denned and described as a prelude to the first required reading for the topic – Oldroyd’s [ 1997] discussion of accounting in Anglo-Saxon England. “Using meta-concepts” includes the application of heuristics which relate to describing processes of historical change, comparing and explaining historical phenomena [van Drie and van Boxtel, 2008, p. 103]. Opportunities for students to use meta-concepts feature significantly in many of the learning tasks, with some specific examples being Study Tasks 5.1 and 6.5 (see Appendix A).

In addition to developing these historical reasoning abilities, students are explicitly informed that the course work and assessments necessitate the further development and demonstration of key generic and meta-cognitive skills in research, analysis, critical thinking, academic writing, and reflective learning [Bisman, 2007a]. One of the introductory readings on the nature of history allows students to relate the skills honed by studying history to the key generic competencies expected of accountants by employers and the professional bodies. The reading rallies a number of arguments [Steams, 1998, p. 2] in making a case that studying history helps to:

create good business people [and] professionals…[with] a broad perspective that gives them the range and flexibility required in many work situations. They develop research skills, the ability to find and evaluate sources of information, and the means to identify and evaluate diverse interpretations. Work in history also improves basic writing and speaking skills and is directly relevant to many of the analytical requirements in the public and private sectors, where the capacity to identify, assess, and explain trends is essential…history particularly prepares students for the long haul in their careers, its qualities helping adaptation and advancement beyond entry-level employment.

Both the mandatory assessment and self-study activities are constructively aligned [Biggs, 2003] with the learning objectives, topic content, and generic attributes assigned for the course. In the formal assessments, students complete a total of 12 learning activities, consisting of four set items in each assessment derived from the Study Tasks and Reflective Activities presented in the course materials. The remaining two items in each assessment allow students to choose a further Study Task and an additional Reflective Activity of particular interest to them. Collectively, the course materials include around 70 Study Tasks and Reflective Activities developed and written specifically for this course, giving students ample scope in determining the self-selected components of their assessments. The first assessment covers Topics 1 to 5 in the course, and the second assessment covers the remaining three topics. Examples of assessable Study Tasks (3.1 and 7.6) are provided in Appendix A.

CONCLUDING COMMENTS

This paper presents a case for accounting history studies to be recognized as an essential and valuable ingredient of accounting education programs, with the intention of producing more competent and informed professional practitioners and, through stimulating an interest in accounting history, engendering the development of the next generation of accounting historians. By detailing the development process, learning objectives, orientation, content, and other elements of a recently created graduate course in accounting history offered by an Australian university, the course model supplies a tentative blueprint for designing similar courses in other contexts or countries.

While slavish adoption of the course model is certainly not suggested since it can be expected that each educator would structure the course according to his/her own background, experience, and epistemic preferences, the model does provide suggestions for educators in thinking about topics, content, sequencing, the role of readings, and the types and function of assessment in such a course. For example, within the U.S. graduate school setting, there is an array of masters programs in accounting offered via distance education and online, so that suggestions concerning the student-centered approach to structuring materials and assessment in the course may be of particular benefit in these settings. However, given that numerous U.S. masters programs are structured to provide the knowledge and skills necessary for successful completion of the CPA Examination, while the Australian course modeled in this paper assumes that students have already completed relevant professional exams, the placement of such a course within particular U.S. programs may be better suited to the doctoral seminar.

One pressing problem encountered in including accounting history in the curriculum is that few universities in Australia, the U.S., or elsewhere have accounting staff interested or experienced in teaching an accounting history course. In their study of accounting and business history in U.S. business programs, Van Fleet and Wren [1982, p. 114] reported the comment that “how much history gets into classes is strictly a function of the instructor’s knowledge and interest,” while Merino [2006, pp. 377-378] contends that most younger faculty “have not been exposed to economic history, much less accounting history.” Consequently, creating new generations of accounting historians is important not only for maintaining an active accounting history community and the continued production and dissemination of historical accounting research, but is also vital in ensuring accounting history is taught within accounting programs in the future. The linking of the research and education aspects is imperative since, as Richardson [2008, p. 269] submits, “the development of accounting history courses and graduate research programs will be the next test of the disciplinary strength of accounting history.” Thus, in addition to inspiring thought (and debate) on accounting history education, the current paper also represents a call to action for accounting history researchers to lobby for and engage in the development of courses in the study of accounting’s past for inclusion in the programs offered by their own universities.

The description and discussion of the course also addresses a lacuna in the existing accounting history and accounting education literatures which provide relatively few examples of accounting history education in practice. There is, however, significant work still to be done with respect to accounting history education. Suggestions for further work include the conduct of attitudinal surveys about accounting history education in Australia and other nations to supplement and compare with the existing U.S. research findings. Also needed is publication of descriptions of dedicated accounting history courses offered at universities since the apparent absence of such literature suggests these courses are largely undocumented at present. In discussing business history education, Harvey and Wilson [2007, p. 3] contend that it may well be taught “by stealth…under the rubric of more contemporary sounding subjects.” Consequently, additional vignettes of accounting history included as part of other accounting courses are also desirable in generating interest and informing teaching practice. An expanded range of articles on accounting history education appearing in the mainstream accounting education literature, as well as in the specialist accounting history journals, is also warranted.

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AHA KMB EOT AK AH

Reflective Activity 2.1: In your opinion, is accounting evolution-ary? Are there merely some aspects of accounting that evolve, while other aspects change or develop in a non-evolutionary manner? Do you think there might be differences between ac-counting ‘evolution’ and accounting ‘progress’? (Activity relates to the reading by Napier, 2001).

Reflective Activity 3.1: In their conclusion, Carmona and Ez-zamel [2007, p. 202] state: ‘even today, there is still a perception that ancient accounting (if it is considered accounting at all) is far too remote to be worth taking seriously’. How do you feel about the nature and worth of ancient accounting history?
Reflective Activity 3.3: How convincing did you find the case advanced by Lu and Aiken [2004] concerning the links between the early Chinese writing system, counting, and accounting?

Reflective Activity 4.4: How important do you think context was in the nature and uses made of the early Australian censuses and musters? (Activity relates to the reading by Bisman [forthcoming, 2009]).

Reflective Activity 6.2: To engage in this activity you will need to refer back to Zaid [2004] on Islamic accounting systems of the Middle Ages and also note the quotation towards the start of the Commentary for Topic 6 which concerns the business dealings of Venetian merchants with Arab merchants during the Renaissance. Zaid [2004, p. 168] says: ‘It is apparent that some of the recording procedures developed and practiced in Muslim society were similar to those which were later [emphasis added] applied in medieval Europe. Indeed, Ball [1960] stated “we can hardly suppose that the Italian merchants were ignorant of the methods of keeping accounts used by their best customers'”. Napier [2007],

in discussing the role of Islamic accounting, states that it has been one of the most significant influences on accounting in the Western world for many centuries and expresses concern that: ‘suggestions that accounting methods in Islamic societies were influences on the emergence and development of double-entry bookkeeping have been resisted’. Given your understanding of the interplay between commerce, social relations, religion, and the spread of particular accounting techniques from one civilization or geographic locale to another, together with your understanding of Pacioli’s work and life, what is your opinion on where the double-entry bookkeeping system developed and who developed it?

Reflective Activity 6.5: What do you think about the idea of the ‘archaeological accountant’ which is a notion underlying the architectural analysis supplied in Mussari and Mussari [2006]? Can you see any similarities in the ideas of an ‘archaeological accountant’ with the modern day role of the forensic accountant?
Reflective Activity 8.7: What aspects of ACC536 interested you the most? Why? What aspects interested you the least? Why? Briefly describe:

(a) three accounting issues, events, crises, procedures or practices covered in your study of ACC536 Accounting and Business History that have had the most impact for you in terms of the way you think about accounting; and

(b) three accounting issues, events, crises, procedures or practices covered in your study of ACC536 Accounting and Business History that have the most impact for you in terms of the way you practice accounting.

Study Task 3.1: ‘The life of a scribe was, according to this Satire of the Trades, a pleasant existence. He has power over everyone. His ability to read and write is more valuable than food, drink, clothes or ointment, even a tomb for the afterlife. If a scribe joined the civil service [government/public sector], it was claimed, he did not have to pay taxes’ [Hayes, 1997, p. 53]. Using the quote above from Hayes [1997] which concerns the power, class and value of ancient Egyptian scribes, together with the information on record-keeping and scribes presented in Brown [1905], compare and contrast the role and status of the scribe with that of the modern-day accountant.

Study Task 5.1: At the end of Reading 5.1, Oldroyd [1997] claims: ‘Evidence of accounting exists in the surviving documentation, in the sophistication of government finances, in the Anglo-Saxon mind-set relating to the use of money and monetary values, and in the continuity between earlier and later periods…’ What are the “continuities between “earlier and later periods” identified in this reading? Compare and contrast the use of money and monetary values in Anglo-Saxon England with that of Classical Antiquity (Topic 4). Compare and contrast the role of government finance and accounting in Anglo-Saxon England with government finance and accounting in both ancient times (Topic 3) and Classical Antiquity (Topic 4).

Study Task 5.3: Based on McDonald [2005], Hooper’s [2006] criticisms of the efficiency calculations made by McDonald, and McDonald’s [2006] response, with whom do you agree and why?

Study Task 6.5: On the basis of Reading 6.4 [Mussari and Mussa-ri, 2006] construct a table which identifies the various personnel and their roles in the accounting systems used at the building yard of the Castello of Crotone during the Renaissance. Compare these roles with modern day specialisations in accounting and business.

Study Task 7.4: In what ways did the political, economic and legal systems and the social context of Meiji era Japan influence accounting for both internal management purposes and external reporting? (Task relates to the reading by McKinnon, 1994).

Study Task 7.6: In Fleischman et al. [2004, p. 41] the authors explain a procedure that was used in accounting for increases and decreases in the number of slaves and elaborate on aspects of this system at later stages in the paper. Compare and contrast this accounting procedure with the procedures used in account-ing for livestock, as detailed in relevant readings in ACC536, during ancient times (Topic 3), in the Middle Ages in Britain (Topic 5), and in medieval Islamic societies [see Zaid, 2004].