Description: Criticizes the way history is presented in current textbooks, and suggests a fresh and more accurate approach to teaching American history.
Brief description:
James W. Loewen (1942-2021) was the bestselling and award-winning author of Lies My Teacher Told Me, Lies Across America, Lies My Teacher Told Me About Christopher Columbus, Sundown Towns, and Lies My Teacher Told Me: Young Readers' Edition (all from The New Press). He also wrote Teaching What Really Happened and The Mississippi Chinese: Between Black and White and edited The Confederate and Neo-Confederate Reader. He won the American Book Award, the Oliver Cromwell Cox Award for Distinguished Anti-Racist Scholarship, the Spirit of America Award from the National Council for the Social Studies, and the Gustavus Myers Outstanding Book Award.
Review Quotes:
Praise for Lies My Teacher Told Me:
"Powerful . . . it serves as a crucial counter-textbook to provide a more realistic and critical narrative about the American past."
-Truthdig
"A treat to read and a serious critique of American education."
-Award Citation, American Book Award
"Remarkable."
-USA Today
"A lively critique."
-The New York Times
"Honest and well-written."
-Harper's Magazine
"Loewen's book contains so much history that it ends up functioning not just as a critique, but also as a kind of counter-textbook that retells the story of the American past."
-The Nation
"Every teacher, every student of history, every citizen should read this book. It is both a refreshing antidote to what has passed for history in our educational system and a one-volume education in itself."
-Howard Zinn