American ethnocentrism

[normalnoises]

Author says U.S. leads world in ethnocentrism

Eduardo Juarez

State Hornet

April 30, 2003

The author of "Lies My Teacher Told Me," the national bestseller that critiques how history is taught in U.S. schools, spoke on campus last week, saying that future history textbooks will portray that America "did the right thing in the Iraq War."

"I believe the United States leads the world in ethnocentrism," said author James Loewen.

Loewen, a sociologist, has written a second book, "Lies Across America: What Our History Sites Get Wrong." His books emphasize the Eurocentric methods of teaching American history in high school and elementary education.

In his book, Loewen chronicles many examples of historic fables and misinterpretations of alleged historical facts. His books also mention how important ethnic minority figures are often misrepresented or not given sufficient exposure in textbooks.

"It's critical to be aware of the information we are provided," said the host of the Loewen seminar and Director of the Multi-cultural Center Leonard Valdez.

Loewen first developed an interest in history "misteaching" when he began teaching social science to freshmen at Tougaloo College in Mississippi.

Segregation still existed when Loewen taught at the all-black school. He realized his students were mistaught in high school history classes and were largely unaware of African-American influences on American history.

"Even history book titles are glamorized," Loewen said.

Loewen also taught at the University of Vermont, which is one of the most prestigious universities in the country. He would eventually realize that "misteaching" was not only a Mississippi problem -- it was an American problem.

In 1980, Loewen and his co-authors presented their own textbook, "Mississippi: Conflict and Chance," to be taught in Mississippi public schools. The Mississippi state government refused, partly due to Loewen's writing on Mississippi's dark past: the lynching of blacks. Loewen challenged the state government in the case of Loewen v. Turnipseed. Loewen was victorious.

"This lesson taught me that history can be a weapon," Loewen said.

Loewen devoted a good portion of his speech to Lincoln's racial attitudes as they pertained to the Civil War. He said Lincoln did not care about African-American rights, but was primarily concerned with "holding a nation together." Also, almost every president before Lincoln owned slaves but high school texts do not teach it.

Loewen spent two years at the Smithsonian studying the 12 leading high school textbooks on American history. According to Loewen, several of the texts were written by white supremacist groups. He also said that many history texts portray the U.S government in a heroic way.

Historians and scholars have termed the era between 1890 and 1940 as the "Nadir Era" of American race relations. This era began with what Loewen calls the three I's: immigration, imperialism (Spanish-American War) and the Indian War.

"You should always be suspicious of (American history) textbooks written during this era," Loewen said.

Not only does Loewen encourage future teachers to question the validity and reliability of history textbooks, he wants students to be aware of historiography.

Historiography is the study of who, when and why history books are written in a certain way.

Loewen is writing a book on "sundown towns."

Sundown towns are towns in the United States that intentionally have all-white populations. They are called sundown towns because certain minority groups are warned to "stay out of this town when the sun goes down." Loewen said there are many suburbs, especially in California, that try to keep out Jews, African-Americans and other minorities.

http://www.statehornet.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2003/04/30/3eaf48c8740cd?in_archive=1

[xpyrate]

Disclaimer: if anyone calls me a racist for this post is completely ignorant of the facts

I completely disagree with this. America was founded by white people with no intention of it becoming a "multi-cultural" society. Before the 70s there were almost no hispanics here in America. The 1965 immagration law changed forever and opened our borders to minorities that were never allowed here in the first place in fact we fought many a war trying to keep them out of here. Americas roots are European, and in my opinion it should stay that way. I have nothing against other cultures, races, etc, it is that white America and whites around the world are somehow being branded as the "evil" in this world by third world countries and their leaders, people such as bin laden. Further, third world nations demand that because we are rich we somehow owe them something because they are suffering. Well, I got news for you, us white people brought civilization to the world. We made the medicines that cure your diseases, we invented technologies that make your life simpler, etc, etc. We white America defined what it means to be "free." Before the Revolutionary War there was a world filled with dictatorships based on inheritance and Europe was far from the least dictatorial of them. We worked, studied and fought hard to make these things a reality. And for nations to demand that we somehow owe it to them to give to them for free is absurd. I am proud of white history and culture and to see it slowly dieing in todays "politically correct" climate saddens me. In 1950 we were approximately 33% of the worlds population and now we are less than 8%. I am in no way suggesting we should go back to the days of the klu klux klan or what-ever, it is that to so much as to suggest anything that is pro-white is automatically deemed "racist" and I find that not only ridiculous but offensive. OK nuff of my lil rant, so Ill end by saying, European culture is on its way out in this world and in a few hundred years there will be no more white people in this world and that is a proven fact. By way that we are not reproducing enough to repopulate the earth with more whites and that other races are reproducing far more quickly than us, among other reasons.

[mala]

I'm not going to touch the above post.

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Back to the op:

What's wrong with thinking your country is the best? I mean, really, many people think this way. Especially us 'merikans. That being said, I'm all for patriotism, just not when it clouds education. I hate the fact that most history books are ethnocentrically biased pieces of shit. I think if you call yourself a historian, you have an obligation to tell it the way it is; not the way the your country of publication would like it to be. I was fortunate to take history courses taught by instructors who cut through all the shit. Sadly, many teachers continue to perpetuate the loads of hooey that was taught to them.

[marksimons]

as a slacking off history student I'm glad we've got around to history at last!

the real problem is that history is catching up with us or something, we need to unravel it fast and sort out the mess which has been created by out parents, grand parents and so on.

the twentieth century was a fucking state, it's amazing the world didn't blow up, given how cheap life has been so often...

the problem is that there are people out there now who have had a hand in things that need far more widespread historical knowledge i.e. what really happend, what really caused things, and to a large extent how things are now...

it's not just history that's being manipulated, it's the present.

it doesn't really surprise me that standard textbooks ain't up to much cop, there's a lot they didn't tell us about in our history lessons too...

[jamiroguy1]

"Lies my teacher told me".... An awesome book.