Welcome to the third gathering of the BooMan Tribune book club, known as BooBooks.
Today, girls and boys, we will be talking about Lies My Teacher Told Me (Everything your American History Textbook Got Wrong), by James W. Loewen.
As you will see, the comments’ section is divided according to the book’s chapters, for ease of discussion.
SPECIAL NOTE*: BooBook Co-ordinator/Moderator Needed. Have you enjoyed BooBooks so far? kansas handled it through today, but she won’t be able to continue. If there’s someone who’d like to take up the reins, here’s the opportunity!
Chapter title: Handicapped by History: The Process of Hero-Making.
“The truth is that Heller Keller was a radical socialist.”
“(But) my students seldom know or speak about two antidemocratic policies that Wilson carried out: his racial segregation of the federal government and his military intervention in foreign countries.”
“‘There are three great taboos in textbook publishing,’ an editor at one of the biggest houses told me, ‘sex, religion, and social class.'”
I am finally up and trying to get lots of coffee down me. I liked HK’s quote about thinking…”People do not like to think. If one thinks, one must draw conclusions. Conclusions are not always pleasant.”
I should have added that this seems exactly what the history books in school set out to do…teach you to learn ‘facts’–wrong facts as it turns out. Make students memorize these ‘facts’ and call it learning. No wonder, as the author points out that students find history boring.
I didn’t know much more about Helen Keller than what I learned from “The Miracle Worker” and from a bio of Annie Sullivan that I bought during grade school from Scholastic. It was eye opening how her civil rights record has been washed clean, so to speak, so that she isn’t controversial. I was thinking about that this week during the MLK funeral. Do students today really KNOW what MLK accomplished? Or is he just a guy that made some good speeches and accomplished “good” things?
hi maryb..I have to wonder if kids nowdays even are aware of MLK other than free school day.. and when I was still trying to work it was pretty disgusting that(in so called liberal CA.) where I worked people were mad about having that ‘nigger’ have a holiday..when I told someone not to use that word in front of me I was later reprimanded by my boss for telling another worker that because it made that person uncomfortable..forget how uncomfortable I was.
I am hoping that the PBS series “Eyes on the Prize” is soon able to be re-run. It has issues because of the copyright license to use some of the music, but I heard they had worked that out. It ought to be mandatory viewing in highschools. Kids don’t know who MLK is. They don’t really understand Brown vs. the Board. You have to actually see the film of those poor little kids walking through crowds of angry adults to get to school in Little Rock to realize what life was like. Because until you see adults abusing children in that way; you can’t really believe it happened. I don’t know why they try to teach late 20th century history out of books anyway. There is so much film — they should use it.
You get your wish Mary, it will be on American Experience in the fall!
REALLY? That is very exciting. I need to tape it this time.
And using film would no doubt capture the students attention more than having to read(unfortunately).
It is sad; but you have to work with what you have.
Me too Maryb. I have begun to think in different terms as to how ppl really did do things in their lives. I really saw a lot of being radical in her. I think that she might have carried some of that from her handicap of not being able to communicate early on in her life. It was good, as I see it, that she was radicalized…..:o)
As to Wilson, I saw him as I see bush today, in many ways, which helped me to understand how he worked. I always did like history and I have to say this is really an eye opener for me.
I also saw where Helen got under the skin of Wilson in the ways they both felt they had to work in order to get things done the way they felt was their way,.
I wonder if she was better able than most to be radical BECAUSE she couldn’t see or hear. She wouldn’t have been bombarded with constant negative feedback from society. Yelling at her wouldn’t work. Raised eyebrows wouldn’t work.
exactly! But when she did learn how to communicate, she became all to aware of those things. I think this really made her angry and frustrated.
It has been theorized that many people who are voting Republican against there own economic interests are caught up in this type of reasoning. That they believe there is complete upward mobility in America and want to believe that someday THEY will be rich and able to take advantage of the tax breaks or whatever. And they don’t realize that the laws are rigged against them. I’d never really thought before about the idea that Highschool textbooks may be responsible for this. And why not? If you learn it in school, it must be true. Right?
While rereading this book information I had forgotten from the first time around jumped out at me. Concerning HK, it is amazing how topical she seems with her ideas and the idea she came to that the myth that if you just work hard enough you can get ahead and succeed. How through her life she came to realize that in a nutshell that no, you sometimes can’t pull yourself up by your bootstraps because your status in a certain social class. Pretty much blasphemy to the American myth of everyone can get ahead if they just work hard and try. No wonder her later life has disappeared from history and what she did accomplish. Such as being one of the founders of the ACLU..
Her quote on that on page 34 says it all.
Yes. “I learned that the power to rise in the world is not within the reach of everyone.” And as America also began to realize this, they accepted the idea of labor unions and the programs of the New Deal. HK learned this from her own power of observation — despite the ironic fact that she could not see or hear. But, as she said, she could smell. She could feel. It’s too bad that the U.S. needs to relearn this lesson.
Big corporations like Wal-Mart are to me anymore the equivalent of the plantation owners …while people at Wal-Mart and literally working at slave wages…to keep the CEO’s who do no work fat, happy, rich and ever more greedy.
Yes there is a certain symmetry. Others would say that it can’t be slavery since it is voluntary and the people can leave. But once Walmart has driven every other business out of town and this is the only possible source of income — it is virtual slavery.
Absolutely. What is depressing is an article I just read in the last few days that stated Wal-Mart which has 3,200 stores nation wide are planning on opening(heaven help us)1,500 more stores in the U.S…and are hoping to open up to 370 next year alone. Just very scary to me.
I agree; however, I think many of us are taught to be content as to our status in life. NOt only from government but sometimes from loved ones, who see it as just the way it is. I never thought things like this and always taught my children they could rise above their own self restrictions. This has sometimes cause caution in the slave owners…:o) I came from a lower middle class family and did things my own way, I was rather independent…I think my kids saw that in me and did things that way too. I think HK saw how the injustices in life was and wanted to change things…just did not do it the way the slave owners thought it ought to be done. I can definitely identify with her…:o)
I saw in my own life that if you were a farmer the boys had to be a farmer too. If a girl y ou had to be a nurse or teacher and housewife. This came with my age group, tho. NOw I see whre I would have been something else if I was younger in this day in age..I see this in HK and her forethought as to future doings in life and government. I think she had insight that maybe only her disability gave to her. Like a seventh sense to things…I call it sometimes gut feelings…I think that sometimes in my line of work, I think I better do something now and get it done for something in the future will/would happen otherwise and usually it is true….
As to wilson, I think he thougt he had the power..and he could do anything he wanted with that power….just like today…I see so much of that today in this government…maybe it has always been there but just did not see it.
I was also happy to see that he tried to break down the myth of Woodrow Wilson the “liberal hero”. I’ve always had an antipathy towards Wilson that was confirmed when I read Margaret MacMillan’s Paris 1919. People today say that history will not treat W well. One could have said the same thing about Wilson and yet he is constantly portrayed as a man driven by a “good” liberal idealogy. The man set back the progress of a good percentage of Americans toward full civil rights by years. He invaded countries because it was good for corporations. And, although he was big on “self-determination”, it only seemed to apply to European countries, not to the countries of Asia, AFrica and the Middle East.
He sold out China at the Paris peace conference probably affecting their move into communism. He helped create the mess that is the middle east. Wilson has a lot to answer for; but not many people know it.
Wilson certainly set back civil rights didn’t he..and the amount of his military interventions are breathtaking. What I want to know is why we keep interfering with Haiti..to this day?
Reading that many blacks were working or being appointed to positions of power, working along side whites until Wilson came along and turned back time is certainly something that should be discussed in our schools..to give context to the whole suppression of black people and their rights.
It seems the general underlying idea that whites had/have of blacks it that from the end of the civil war to the civil rights movement is that blacks were too dumb or lazy to get ahead and why it took so long for them to do anything regarding civil rights.
Education is full of subtle (and not so subtle) messages to students that affect them their whole lives. Girls are weak and shouldn’t act too smart. Indians are savages who drank too much. Blacks were historically not smart enough to allow reconstruction to work. He’s right. It all works to keep the people in power right there at the top — rich, white, wasp men. And no wonder people who are not fortunate to be born into a family that gives them a sense of their own self worth end up feeling like the problem is with THEM — if THEY were smarter, if THEY weren’t so emotional, etc. things would be different.
You’re right about the overall message in the history books. The way language is used to shape the opinion of young minds to the ‘white is right’ attitude is really appalling. The more I read, the more aware I am about how pervasive and insidious this language is and how it is used.
Right. When in the days before TV, all the kids had was makebelieve to make fun in their lives. They makebelieved that one side was cowbowys and the other side was indians or that one side was America and the other side what the ENEMY of what ever it was that they want the enemy to be. I see how the text books became so important in the lives of the very young in the very early age of ppl such as me…and sometimes now when kids play together. It can become looked at that way…and god now we have this TV thing to give them ideas!!!!! SEE WHERE I am leading to…everything can be a learning experience if let be…anyhow that is how I see it…Then when the kids grow up and think differently they certainly think things are the same way as they learned even it if was the wrong thing to learn.
couple of reasons off the top o’ the head:
–the Monroe Doctrine
–the image of free blacks self-governing is intolerable to the rulers
–it’s an important stop on the Columbia – US cocaine routes
Ok now that we’ve had this great discussion. I have to tell you that I didn’t really LIKE this book all that much. I learned a lot; which kept me reading. But I felt like I was reading an extended dissertation. And considering that its only 318 pages — but I could never bring myself to even start the last chapter. If Family Man is lurking out there; he will know how difficult I found this to read since I read through all of John Adams in less than a couple of weeks with no problem except that I didn’t have enough time. I’ve been working on this for a month.
There I’ve admitted it. Now, where are all the OTHER people who were supposed to read this?
The first time I read this book I read it almost in one sitting..and when rereading it did the same thing. I found it fascinating-but in an awful way. I’ve been meaning to read the John Adams books and remember you and Family Man talking about it.
Yes, where is everyone else?
I meant to read it… but I got all caught up in Kansas’s and BostonJoe’s books instead!
We forgive you.
I was happy my other bookclub for the month was cancelled or I would have had to have stopped to read that book. (Since I see those people face to face.)
Wow. I’m impressed. But as I say, I learned a lot. I just found it hard going.
I enjoyed reading the book. I saw that I learned some things in it that Starkravin and GDW and maybe a few others talked about here and that really lead me to already identify with things. After reading this book, I am giving it to my GD to have for her own purpose to refer to to actually not believe everything she hears…I want her to actually think for herself and not just assume things ae like they are being taught. I want her to know that even a grandmother can learn too….:o)
I actually identified with the first book review here and how it described the indian and migrating to the south , IE, in LA I can not remember the names of the tribes but I remember how it came about in that first book review. It also came about in this one too. I found this as a growing of my mind in learning and that is why I am here in the first place..to learn.
I learned from my grandmother that learning is a lifelong experience. She was always sad that she had never had the opportunity to go to college but frankly she was better educated from all the reading she did than many of the people who DO graduate from college. And considering that she was born in a log cabin in western Kentucky — she was right to be proud that she had graduated from high school!
So grandmother’s are excellent role models for learning.
Sorry for not participating in the actual discussion (I memorized the book years ago, just kidding!)….
But as to “liking” the book: I think it’s more designed to be reference work than a sit-down read from cover-to-cover book that one would “like” or “dislike.”
This a book I return to again and again as a “resource” to “check the facts” (and if there’s a single teacher out there who is aware of the book and not doing the same, shame on them!)..: I could also envision using it as a textbook in a high-school history class. To me, it functions much like a dictionary, and does so very well.
Aren’t textbooks supposed to feel like “extended dissertations”?
Please recite from memory the discussion on page 232.
I liked when he went into the actual history. But I got bored by the portions where he went through all 12 textbooks in detail to tell us how they handled it. I appreciated the fact that he didn’t just make the statement that the books were wrong and expect us to trust him. But I constantly was wishing he had put a lot of that discussion in the footnotes.
“If we do not speak of it, others will surely rewrite the script.” (p. 232) 😉
I can see the value of having put those “asides” in footnotes, but you know how it is with footnotes: some people hate em and others love em.
ward churchill is (in)famous for his “copious footnoting” and it is one thing that attracted me to his work.
I once wrote a 200-or so page piece: it consisted of one sentence (about 5 wds, grammatically correct) and seven footnotes.
When I came back to the US after nearly 10 yrs abroad, to post-Reagan America, I said: Holy shit man, i can’t even write one sentence in this country anymore without extensive footnotes….thus was born the unpublished (and long since abandoned): Cosmic Joke: Who Didn’t Get it and Why. (copyright Stark, ’93). I’ve always thought I should go back to it: it would have been ideally suited to the kind hyper-linking we have on the net b/c the seven footnotes also had sub-footnotes, man it was a bitch trying keep that shit straight using a Brother X10 typewriter and whiteout!
So you see, I’m a footnote lover, but my experience in the publishing industry is that the footnote haters are in the majority (am currently working for two ‘footnote haters’ and must repress my love of footnotes to adapt to my clients’ needs).
😉
oops. not “5 wds”–500, of course.
Damn. I was enthralled by the idea of a 200 page paper consisting of a 5 word text and the rest was footnotes.
OH now that is way toooo far out!!!! Wow could that even be a thought in someones mind…:o) At least hugs for the thought…
That would be the NIE… a fantasy from the pen of Richard Milhouse “Dick” Cheney…which apparently nobody read.
Sorry to be OT
Carry on
Peace
that would have run counter to my affinity for “500 word sentences ending in prepositions”–that was the other thing, it ended in preposition.
I don’t want to clutter up this thread with my ramblings, but I’m afraid I must burden you with one more footnote (then I’ll bug out, promise):
My penchant for 500 wd sentences ending in prepositions was inspired by one of my undergraduate engl profs who told this joke (in an inimicable, entirely authentic and thick as the ass-end of a possum’s tail Arkansas accent):
So this Texan gets a scholarship to Harvard, arrives on campus and asks this guy in a pin-striped suit:
Can you tell me where the li’berry’s s at ?
Suit says: this is Haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaavard and at Haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaavard, we don’t end our sentences in prepositions.
Texan: Ok, then, can you tell me where the li’berry’s at, asshole?
(In my adaptation of my best professor. ever’s joke,
it’s “can you tell me where the lies is buried at, asshole?”
And that would be the Post-colonialist or post-Loewen version of the joke. 😉
And with that–lthanks for carrying on this discussion and to everyone for taking time to pay attention to this book. It’s not perfect, but it’s a damn good resource. Moving toward critical mass…………….<
You all do know that he’s also got a website right?
Now. I am officially turning on the imaginary “Blog filter” and getting back to work.
Chapter title: The True Importance of Christopher Columbus
“The authors of history textbooks have taken us on a trip of their own, away from the facts of history, into the realm of myth. They, and we have been duped by an outrageous concoction of lies, half-truths, and omissions.”
I can start this discussion. I found the discussion of Eurocentrism fascinating in this chapter.
I liked how he challenged us to think about whether it really is “natural” for one group to dominate another group.
And according to quite a few studies now Americans seem to be well not stupider but much less educated than other countries. Ok maybe more stupid.
As we mentioned above it really is amazing how the language in the the history books fosters and doesn’t question at all the implied destiny and ‘rightness’ about conquering the new world.
I also found it interesting to think of the arms race as a process that had been ongoing since the 1400s. I knew most of that history but I had never before put it in the context of an “arms race” that we are still living with.
One quote that really caught my eye in this chapter was the contemporary (1517) description of the suffering of the Indians on the Spanish plantations (p. 63):
I don’t really have anything to say about it. It speaks for itself.
Since I did nto make history my minor in college, I am learning more than ever on this one man. This alone can make a young mind bend to the fact that the hero of CC was not a good man…just oh wow, I can hear them say…:o) I know I was seriously taken back by some of his history..and that he actually did do bad thins to the indians in the indes…took them for slave trades to europe and then there is the history of europeans, it seems…I suppose I may not have been listening to carefully during those times…but I would rather think it was not ever taught.
I’m jumping in here for a second. Brenda your comment on it was not ever taught, rings true.
I was thinking earlier it would be interesting to look at a history book from 30-50 years ago. Once you’ve gone through it, compare it to how the same history is taught now. It appears to me you’ll never have one true history, you’ll have many differnet versions. Just depends on who is in power.
Sad but true.
FM, you do have a point. I suppose it depends on who is in power. I just remember what I was taught and I do believe it has not change that much. Maybe it has and since I am of the age that I am, and not knowing, you probably are right on…:o)
Brenda I’m 53 and I haven’t read any of the new history book. I was thinking of what is being forced into schools by different groups, religous or political. I know people back then looked at things differently and I can only attribute that to what we/they were taught. I feel now of days with the internet, kids might be getting a little clearer view of history. At least I hope so ;).
You are right on with that one! The internet has made a definite difference in may ways of learning. IMHO, we do not have to go to the library for researching any more…:o) I do know to read some journals you have to pay money to get them, unless the articles are way out of date. Still then you run the chance of having to pay for the article.
The internet is so viable today for the young that parents have to almost stand over the child to supervise its usage. The open highway is a dangerous highway for children if not supervised properly, in so many ways.
The history books of today is probably like the years of the past. Like the one who wrote this book, he has always impressed me with the fact that it is a definite challenge to get something that is not standard reading material, hero worship, etc, into these books.
I feel that the kids of today, with the internet understands that there is more history out there online that in these books and that they are just for reference material nowadays…:o) ((speaking of the text books in school))
It is like how dare a child go on the search of other reading material for their high school reading material. Like I seriously doubt that this book will ever be purchased for any school library. Don’t you think? Just MHO…..
Yes I agree with you.
My nephew had to write a paper and he was only allowed to use one reference from the Internet. The rest had to be from the books they were given.
So I feel this book won’t be found in many school libraries because it teaches a different history than what is commonly accepted.
Hard to even begin to talk about Columbus because I consider him to about as much of a hero as GW. Years ago just from the very little I had read I’ve refused to have anything to do with Columbus day but after reading this book for the first time I was practically ill at the idea that this man continues to be honored. Even though many historians now know much more about what he really did to begin slave trade and the decimation of the Indian population which is son basically continued..the history books continue to perpetrate the myth. The magnitude of this decimation is almost beyond belief..and thinking he did this of course in the name of his Christian god makes it only more abhorrent.
One aspect about the Columbus myth that I found fascinating in these chapters was the idea that the whole world is flat idea was yet another myth we were taught. That many people and especially sailors did not at the time believe this anymore. Yet the myth of Columbus was that he was a visionary who forged ahead to challenge the old thinking and that the world was not flat…just amazing the amount of myth..or lies if you want to be more accurate really surrounding CC.
As an aside .. I enjoyed the story of the Irish discovering America because I heard that while I was in Ireland last April. We were at the Cliffs of Moher looking out to the west “toward America” and one of the Irishmen who was with us told us that story about the Irish discovering America.
Yes, I liked the timeline in the book with various explorers/groups of people and the rating of high to low about these stories or explorations being true.
If students were taught to actually think or draw any kind of conclusions of what they are being taught it rather defies any logical reason that no one before Columbus wanted to venture forth to discover what was beyond the horizon.
Chapter title: The Truth About the First Thanksgiving
“Starting the story of America’s settlement with the Pilgrims leaves out not only the Indians but also the Spanish.” Also “omits the Dutch.”
“But when I ask my students about the plague, they just stare back at me. ‘What plague?’ The Black Plague?’ ‘No,’ I sigh, that was three centuries earlier.'”
“Origin myths do not come cheaply. To glorify the Pilgrims is dangerous.”
I want to tell you that one night reacently, I was having dinner with my daughter and my 2 grand-daughters. I was actually discussing the book with my oldest GD and her mother and the youngest GD was all ears as to what I was saying..When I looked beyond the oldest GD, so was the woman at the next table..:o) It was like I was talking something bad to her. Can you believe this that the woman was looking at me with a scorn look on her face!!! (((I bet she was republican..:o) and a teacher to boot…oh just kidding..hope you know…)))
That’s very funny. I’m surprised she didn’t ask the manager to eject you for causing a disturbance by speaking the truth to your own dinner companions.
My first comment on this chapter is that I refuse to believe there the story of Thanksgiving is any different than the story I learned in grade school. I liked making my pilgrim and Indian place cards. So I am choosing to stick with that version.(snark)
But I did like hearing about the real Squanto.
His is a fascinating story isn’t it and I suppose one also glossed over probably partly due to the fact that he had been sold into slaverly not once but twice. Also if his story would be told it would show that many other people had ended up here before our supposed ‘Pilgrim Fathers’.
Again it’s amazing how completely fabricated the whole Pilgrim Thanksgiving myth is..even to the fact that they were only 35 of the 102 of the people on the Mayflower. And that Plymouth was already or had been a thriving town of the Indians…it wasn’t this barren or unpopulated land that the Pilgrims then hewed a new town into.
One of the most surprising facts was the idea that these people knew nothing about farming whatsoever apparently. Also that the Native American population was already decimated by disease from all previous explorers and settlers.
Chapter title: Red Eyes
“Historically, American Indians have been the most lied-about subset of our population.”
“Native Americans are not and must not be props in a sort of theme park of the past.”
“John Mohawk has argued that American Indians are directly or indirectly responsible for the public-meeting tradition, free speech, democracy, and all things which got attached to the Bill of Rights.”
“Textbooks give readers no clue as to what zone of contact was like from the Native side.”
The most of the things I did want to address about this chapter was how the American Indian was really feeling betrayed by the WHITE man. The Indian has a great government system of their own society and I think still do. I think we all could learn a lot from them if given our selves the chance to let it happen. And to be driven the way there wer by us to their demise is such a terrible part of our history. We were taking everything away from them, killing them in many ways not ever seen by them before. We were taught as a very young person to look upon them as 2nd degree citizens…such a very sad shame on America. I think this is the mindset of today in some of what we are seeing in thetoric by the abramhoff ppl…look at what they called the indians, making fun of them and their mindset.
This was the chapter I enjoyed the most since I was already familiar with most of the “truth” — so in this case I was interested in seeing how textbooks presented the facts. Some of you may remember that I enjoyed the PBS series on the French and Indian war. It was very good and more balanced than usual. But still, the “good guys” were clearly George Washington and his cohorts. And even much of the Indian portion of the story was told from the point of view of the Iroquois — who were allies (to a point) with the British. The fascinating Indians to me were the ones on the French side. Braddock was defeated by an attack of predominantly Indians and the greatest force in them was led by a man named Charles Langlade — who was half french and half indian and led his mother’s people from their home near GREEN BAY (yes Wisconsin) to fight in Western Pennsylvania. He was a man who was able to straddle the cultural divide between his two peoples — French and the Indians. Much has been written about the British conquest of Canada, but not nearly enough about men like Langlade. Under the French regime, coming from two cultures was an asset. Under the British, he was a “half breed” — somehow lesser because of his mother’s race. I’m not standing up for the French completely, but not enough is taught about their influence in American history.
Again, it’s amazing how this rich and varied history of Native Americans, all the various peoples, have been completely left out of the history of how the Europeans ‘settled’ this country.
From all the Indian wars to the diversity of cultures to their integrating with the Europeans until they would then be continually pushed from their land, made slaves..another aspect of history I really wasn’t aware of-how many Native Americans were slaves until they were replaced by the African slave trade.
One of my favorite poets, Kenneth Irby, scandalously neglected by his peers, still teaching at the U of Kansas in Lawrence, from an untitled poem dedicated to the great eco-geographer Carl Sauer:
Chapter title: Gone With the Wind
“Americans seem perpetually startled at slavery.”
“Textbooks have trouble acknowledging that anything might be wrong with white Americans, or with the United States as a whole.”
“The Second Seminole War was the longest and costliest war the United States ever fought against the Indians.. . .only six of the twelve textbooks even mention the war. Of these only four say the ex-slaves fought with (on the side of) the Seminoles; not one tells that the ex-slaves were the real reason for the war.”
“In the way the textbooks structure their discussion (of Reconstruction), most of them inadvertently still take a white supremicist viewpoint. Their rhetoric makes African-Americans rather than whites the ‘problem’. . .”
Exactly and that mindset still is around today, I feel. I just do not knwo what will break the chain of thinking as to this. I really wished I had an anserw to this perpelxment.
The biggest flaw in America is the inability to discuss this.
I think that wat went on in NOLA recently in our history, for some anyhow, actually showed how this is still true today. NOt only for the African-American ppl, but to that of the other nationalities too. Vietnamise, Spanish/Mexican, poor white, American Indians, the old and others. All were considered the slaves of today…supressed to the fact they could not evacuate a dangerous zone to save their lives. I will always say it is a way to kill off them so we do not have to support them any longer..That is how I see this group of ppl in power today….I hate that way of treating ppl and I hope they get what is coming to them while I am still alive to witness it with my very own eyes, too..
The most excentric ways to think of THOSE were that like DTF and others are describing today. It is like US and THEM!
That has always been around to make sense of things…dont you think?
This really is a massive flaw in the country’s pyche(how the hell do you spell that). As long as Americans(mostly white Americans) want to believe that racism/prejudice are only isolated incidents than we really are doomed to have this continue to fester and the ‘blame the victim’ syndrome perpetrated.
Several ideas and facts in this chapter were of particular interest to me, one was the redefinition of the term ‘carpetbaggers’ and how grossly misused it has been in the (so called) history books.
Also seeing as how filibustering was quite topical this last month the fact that the longest filibuster in history was done by Senators opposing the 1964 Civil Rights Act..534 hours to be exact.
The history books portray race relations as a steady and progressive march forward yet this book clearly shows how after the Civil War the KKK rose to power and the rights of black people were eroded…to say nothing of the incredible rise in violence toward black communities and outright killing of black people even whole towns.
Or the history that gives lie to the fact that Jackie Robinson was not the first black baseball player to be make it to the the National leagues.
Chapter title: John Brown and Abraham Lincoln
“Perhaps the most telling criticism Frances FitzGerald made in her 1979 survey of American history textbooks, America Revised, was that they leave out ideas. As presented by textbooks of the 1970’s, ‘American political life was completely mindless,’ she observed.”
“American textbooks give us no way to understand the role of ideas in our past.”
I read the second half of this chapter, as luck would have it, right after a conversation here about framing. And while I knew that Abraham Lincoln was a great communicator, I had never before considered that he had participated in what we would call framing.
There follows a discussion (pp182-183) analyzing what is essentially framing in the Gettysburg address that is fascinating both on its own and in connection with the current discussion on the use of framing.
The rest of the analysis is equal enlightening.
An amazing and again untold chapter of history having to do with race and equality for everyone.
I can’t remember what exactly I was taught about John Brown except the overall impression that I remember from my school days is that this was a very crazy man who was mentally unbalanced and a killer…a very scary man that we were lucky he was killed.
These ‘facts’ of course I believed(why wouldn’t I?)until much later in life I started getting interested in history and especially to do with civil rights only to find out what I was taught was incredibly wrong and not only about John Brown.
Chapter title: The Land of Opportunity
“The students blame the poor for not being successful.”
“The largest single difference between our two main political parties lies in how their members think about social class: 55 percent of Republicans blamed the poor for their poverty, while only 13 percent blamed the system for it; 68 percent of Democrats, on the other hand, blamed the system, while only 5 percent blamed the poor.”
*”Teachers ‘expressed fear that students might find out about the injustices and inequalities of their economic and political institutions.’ By never blaming the system, American history courses present ‘Republican history.'”
This chapter to me seems the whole crux of what is wrong with history books. The complete denial of how economic social system is rigged against the poor and how everything from presidential budgets which make no real progress in leveling the playing field in poorer communities to the completely mythical notion that if you just work hard and study you to can become a millionaire.
Truly the biggest damaging myth perpetrated by the powers that be on the general public. Blame the victim continues to be alive and well with this propaganda.
Chapter title: Watching Big Brother
“The ten narrative textbooks in my sample continue to pay overwhelming attention to the actions of the executive branch of the federal government. They still demarcate U.S. history as a series of presidential administrations.”
“. . .textbook authors portray a heroic state, and, like their other heroes, this one is pretty much without blemish. Such an approach converts textbooks into anticitizenship manuals–handbooks for acquiescence.”
“Since textbook authors are unwilling to criticize the U.S. government, they present opponents of the U.S. that are not intelligible. Only by disclosing our actions can textbooks provide readers with rational accounts of our adversaries.”
Please place your comments that don’t pertain to specific chapters here.
The remaining chapters will go up a bit later.
What struck me about John Brown was that he was labeled a lunatic. He was messing with powerful interests by bringing major national attention to his anti-slavery views. So he gets smeared for saying something that is not only morally correct but made sense even in a calculated foreign policy kind of way. The Rove mentality has been alive and well at least since 1859.
This is a really cool book. Its refreshing and so many things he relates were a part of my History classes that I remember from the 60 and 70’s. Reconstruction is a completely untold story the southern resistance to it and the norths abandoning of the job. Then abandoning our soul for for quite awhile. I never new about the amount of killings or how the noble cause of Reconstruction was misrepresented in our history books.
Absolutely floored by the Columbus brutality. I had thought he was the average run of the mill murderer or dated corporate criminal type but the amount of peoples deaths he was responsible for ranks him up there with the worlds all time butchers.
I’m up to the chapter on labor and am eager to finish the book.
Chapter title: Down the Memory Hole
“Many African societies divide humans into three categories:”
those still alive on earth;
those recently departed who still live in the memory of the living;
the dead (nobody alive who knew them).
“The sasha (recently departed) is our most important past, because it is not dead but living-dead. Its theft by textbooks and teachers is the most wicked crime schools perpetrate on high school students, depriving them of perspective about the issues that affect them.”
Chapter title: Progress Is Our Most Important Product
“Internationally, referring to have-not countries as ‘developing nations’ has helped the ‘developed nations’ avoid facing the injustice of worldwide stratification. In reality ‘development’ has been making Third World nations poorer, compared to the First World.’
“. . .the United States has wound up with the largest gap of any country in the world between what historians know and what the rest of us are taught.”
“To maintain a stratified system, it is terribly important to control how people think about that system.. . .If members of the elite come to think that their privilege was historically justified and earned, it will be hard to persuade them to yield opportunity to others. If members of deprived groups come to think that their deprivation is their own fault, then there will be no need to use force or violence to keep them in their place.”
“If the country is so wonderful, why must we lie?”
Chapter title: What Is the Result of Teaching History Like This?
“Equally as worrisome is the impact of American history courses on white affluent children.”
” . .educated Americans (are) more hawkish.”
“Both the allegiance and socialization process cause the educated to believe that what America does is right. Public opinion polls show the nonthinking results.”
Today’s a work day, so I can’t really participate in the discussion as much as I’d like, but I do have to comment that I was pretty much blown away by the chart showing the education-level breakdown on opposition to the Vietnam War. So much for college as a means to pry those closed minds open!
I’d love for someone with some knowledge of the history of education in the U.S. to address this question: How the hell did the entire educational system, from preschool to graduate level, become one big vocational education program? Its sole formal and informal function seems to be to sort and slot people into their proper roles in the socio-economic system, based primarily on what part of the system they were born into. The concept of encouraging intellectual development and realization of potential doesn’t live there anymore, if it ever did.
No wonder arts programs are cut while sports thrive–arts present the dangerous possibility of creativity, while sports instill discipline and obedience to authority.
“foggy”bottom got a bit of chapters ll and 12 mixed up together.
Are you going to start a new thread soon? I’d love to FP this in a bit, but should wait if you’re putting up a new thread.
E-mail me with info. Thanks!