History books are a series of half-truths
Beth Clothier
Issue date: 3/25/09 Section: Opinion
Living in a country that began impeachment processes against one of its recent leaders for lying about an affair, it's hard to reconcile the fact that we are basically lied to every day under the pretext of education. I'm talking about the way our country's history books are written, and the biased tales we are forced to learn as facts.
When I was in grade school oh so many years ago, we were taught the basics about our country's history: Christopher Columbus was the first person to "discover" America and the pilgrims and Native Americans lived in peaceful harmony. Our ancestors taught the natives how to have a better life, and we were never meant to think about or question how their culture had successfully sustained itself for hundreds of years before the pilgrims showed up.
This was just the beginning of the mountain of lies and half-truths presented as facts meant to cast our predecessors in a good light. After all, isn't it much easier on our collective conscience if we can believe the fairytale of the first Thanksgiving, or that Columbus was a poor, unlucky man who finally had something he planned work out for a change?
Unfortunately, a history geared toward learning dates of battles by rote, vilification of anyone deemed an "enemy" and ancestral sainthood for our country's heroes doesn't leave much in the way of an actual connection to the past, or a means for us to question its validity. The way history is taught, at least in my experience, is often meant to encourage feelings of pride and patriotism, with facts that might make us uncomfortable quietly pushed under the rug.
This practice doesn't apply solely to American history, of course, and how could it?
There are two sides to every tale, after all, and I can't see that any country would want to sound weak or victimized. I follow a number of online blogs, one written by a young Canadian with a degree in history, who just the other day wrote about the differences in how her country and the United States view the War of 1812.
When I was in grade school oh so many years ago, we were taught the basics about our country's history: Christopher Columbus was the first person to "discover" America and the pilgrims and Native Americans lived in peaceful harmony. Our ancestors taught the natives how to have a better life, and we were never meant to think about or question how their culture had successfully sustained itself for hundreds of years before the pilgrims showed up.
This was just the beginning of the mountain of lies and half-truths presented as facts meant to cast our predecessors in a good light. After all, isn't it much easier on our collective conscience if we can believe the fairytale of the first Thanksgiving, or that Columbus was a poor, unlucky man who finally had something he planned work out for a change?
Unfortunately, a history geared toward learning dates of battles by rote, vilification of anyone deemed an "enemy" and ancestral sainthood for our country's heroes doesn't leave much in the way of an actual connection to the past, or a means for us to question its validity. The way history is taught, at least in my experience, is often meant to encourage feelings of pride and patriotism, with facts that might make us uncomfortable quietly pushed under the rug.
This practice doesn't apply solely to American history, of course, and how could it?
There are two sides to every tale, after all, and I can't see that any country would want to sound weak or victimized. I follow a number of online blogs, one written by a young Canadian with a degree in history, who just the other day wrote about the differences in how her country and the United States view the War of 1812.
Be the first to comment on this story