Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong | 
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| Author: James W. Loewen
Publisher: Touchstone
Category: Book
List Price: $16.00
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Avg. Customer Rating:  419 reviews
Sales Rank: 2282
Media: Paperback
Edition: 1
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 384
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.9
Dimensions (in): 9.1 x 6.1 x 0.7
ISBN: 0684818868
Dewey Decimal Number: 973
EAN: 9780684818863
ASIN: 0684818868
Publication Date: September 3, 1996
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Book Description
Winner of the 1996 American Book Award and the Oliver Cromwell Cox Award for Distinguished Anti-Racist Scholarship Americans have lost touch with their history, and in this thought-provoking book, Professor James Loewen shows why. After surveying twelve leading high school American history texts, he has concluded that not one does a decent job of making history interesting or memorable. Marred by an embarrassing combination of blind patriotism, mindless optimism, sheer misinformation, and outright lies, these books omit almost all the ambiguity, passion, conflict, and drama from our past. In ten powerful chapters, Loewen reveals that: - The United States dropped three times as many tons of explosives in Vietman as it dropped in all theaters of World War II, including Hiroshima and Nagasaki
- Ponce de Leon went to Florida mainly to capture Native Americans as slaves for Hispaniola, not to find the mythical fountain of youth
- Woodrow Wilson, known as a progressive leader, was in fact a white supremacist who personally vetoed a clause on racial equality in the Covenant of the League of Nations
- The first colony to legalize slavery was not Virginia but Massachusetts
From the truth about Columbus's historic voyages to an honest evaluation of our national leaders, Loewen revives our history, restoring to it the vitality and relevance it truly possesses.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 414 more reviews...
 Ignorance in Print September 4, 2008
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
It's terribly sad that a person so ignorant was able to find a publisher to put this tirade in print. It shows how truly low American publishing has fallen.
 An indespensible reference to real American History August 29, 2008
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
When I was in school, history was one of the most boring topics on the menu. The books were dry as dust and the "learning process" was little more than rote memorization. As a senior, I finally encountered one good teacher who went off the curriculum. That changed my life, and I took a degree (as well as additional graduate work) in history.
When I saw this book, I was stunned. I couldn't believe I'd missed the first edition and eagerly picked up the second. It's excellent. It doesn't follow the public-school model of discussing only positive aspects of American History, while discounting anything negative that might upset parents or kids. It shows where we've been -- warts and all.
This is the way history should be taught in schools. As it is, we're lying to the kids to "protect" them from inconvenient facts. This does no one any good. To this day, I encounter people who (for example) firmly believe Colonial America was an egalitarian, religious paradise when this is obviously not the case. I always wondered why they were unable to let go of these beliefs in the face of other evidence. Then I read this book and understood. All they knew was what they learned from the really horrible texts used in public schools.
And this is not a "liberal rewriting" of history, as some others have claimed. The author provides exhaustive footnotes and other references from primary materials to support his points. The difference between this and public school texts is that the latter are forced to tread a narrow political line, and consequently discard any distressing or negative data in favor of dumbed-down pablum that's acceptable to school boards.
Throw away your textbooks except as studies in deception and childish delusion. This is real history. Read it, learn, and understand.
If you love America, read this book! You'll love America August 27, 2008
even more afterwards, and will find U.S. history more interesting. I'm sure that any patriot, liberal or conservative, will be fascinated and touched by the stories in here.(That's part of why I don't think the reviewer for Booklist read a single chapter; I bet he thought he could tell a book from its table of contents.)
By the way, you will be reassured that Abraham Lincoln really was a great leader, rather than a politician overhyped after assassination. It made me feel so great after reading so many attacks on him in the books I've read, including my high school history text.
I bet you will be surprised in what you learn about carpetbaggers and Reconstruction! Sure didn't learn that in my textbook!
Fantastic August 16, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I purchased this book years ago and I still have it. I purchased it after high school (catchy title - what can I say) and have been a history fan ever since. This book should be required reading. Who decided that dry facts and dates are what should comprise a history class? History becomes fun and fascinating when you move past the whitewashed versions of people and truly examine their motivation, inner demons and flaws. I have gone on to read a multitude of history books and continue to search for the soul in people who have accomplished things that aren't regulated to footnotes.
Great read for anyone who hasn't thought about history since high school August 13, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
If you've never had in interest in history and remember cringing at the site of your 1000-page textbook and droll high school American History teacher, this book will engage and enthrall you.
Even people with a profound interest in history and some historians will learn a thing or two from this eye-opening Loewen account of how and why history textbooks failed us as children and continue to fail children K-12 today.
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