Lies My Teacher Told Me

Description

James W. Loewen examines twelve widely used American high-school history textbooks and asks why their accounts so often make the past less accurate, less controversial, and less interesting. Comparing their narratives across subjects from pre-Columbian societies and Columbus to slavery, Reconstruction, Thanksgiving, Helen Keller, and the My Lai massacre, he identifies omissions, Eurocentric assumptions, and myths presented as settled fact. Loewen argues that textbooks flatten historical figures into uncomplicated heroes and avoid the conflicts that make their choices intelligible. He proposes teaching achievements beside failures and replacing bland consensus with evidence, causation, and debate. The book is both a critique of classroom materials and an argument that honest complexity gives students a stronger way to understand American history.

Themes