NEWS: Books Often Give History a Facelift
Peggy
Books Often Give History a Facelift
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/02/education/02LESS.html
October 2, 2002
By RICHARD ROTHSTEIN
THE Texas Board of Education will soon decide which history
textbooks may be used in the state. Activists on the left
and right are lobbying the board, to influence its choices.
One text has already been withdrawn because it referred to
prostitution in frontier towns. A board member felt this
was inappropriate for high school students to read.
A group called the Texas Public Policy Foundation has
attacked the simplistic glorification of minority groups
that is now conventional in American education.
The foundation wants texts modified to tell how African
chieftains, not Europeans, captured slaves for sale in
America. It wants to emphasize the role of white Europeans
in ending slavery. It objects to portrayals of President
John F. Kennedy and Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy as
civil rights supporters, noting that the brothers refused
to support the movement at crucial times.
The group also wants texts to say that the Constitution
protects an individual's right to own guns and that the
wealthy pay a disproportionate share of income taxes.
American publishers sell hundreds of millions of dollars
worth of social studies texts each year. Texas is the
second-largest buyer in that market, after California.
Because issuing separate editions for each state is
expensive, changes required by Texas will affect texts
everywhere.
There is nothing new about this. As Frances FitzGerald
noted in her 1979 book, "America Revised," since the 1950's
"New England children, whose ancestors heartily disapproved
of the Mexican War, have grown up with heroic tales of Davy
Crockett and Sam Houston" - not because historians felt the
war was justified but to appease Texans who decided if
books were acceptable.
Nor is Texas the only place where schoolbooks have been
pawns in adult political fights.
A new book by Jonathan Zimmerman, "Whose America?" (Harvard
University Press, 2002), develops Ms. FitzGerald's themes.
Dr. Zimmerman shows how early 20th-century texts described
the American Revolution as a complex event, including class
conflict between propertied and poor colonists. Antagonism
of colonists toward England was played down, and support
for independence by some Englishmen was highlighted.
Dr. Zimmerman says this treatment partly resulted from
growing numbers of immigrants in schools at the time.
Educators aimed to get children "Americanized," defined as
adopting Anglo-Saxon culture and identity. Demonization of
King George III would have undermined this goal.
The perspective was reversed in the 1920's as newly
powerful Irish immigrant leaders demanded a more
anti-British stance. William H. Thompson, Chicago's
Irish-American mayor, had the city's school superintendent
dismissed for using "treasonous" pro-British texts.
The country's most popular history textbook was then
revised to remove descriptions of protesters against the
Stamp Act as a "mob" and of Boston Massacre victims as
"ruffians." In New York City, politicians demanded that
books portray the Revolution as a crusade of other
nationalities against the British. Minor revolutionary
figures like the Poles Thaddeus Kosciusko and Casimir
Pulaski, the Jew Haym Solomon, the Frenchman the Marquis de
Lafayette and the German Friedrich von Steuben became
heroes in the curriculum. This multicultural fable remains
a staple of history texts.
Today's books, and standardized tests issued by the same
publishers, not only portray each minority as heroic, but
every group (and each sex) is airbrushed to eliminate the
possibility of stereotyping.
Portrayals of African-Americans as maids or athletes
(except for Jackie Robinson), of women as housewives, of
Mexicans as farm laborers or of Jews as businessmen are not
permitted. This ensures that books and tests pass muster
without objection from officials in Texas and other states
that also allow schools to buy only approved texts.
Are books now more bland and mythical than before? Perhaps
not, but they may be more dangerous. In the past, some
states, districts could dissent and use books with
different slants from the one in fashion. Teachers who had
historical sophistication could add their own materials or
ignore the texts altogether.
But today, curriculums are more standardized, especially as
we measure all students with similar tests. On the one
hand, policy makers want teachers to have more knowledge in
the subjects they teach and more skill in deciding how to
teach them. On the other, teachers have less freedom to
design their lessons.
It is unclear which tendency will prevail. But if
standardization wins out, political fights like the one in
Texas will become ever more influential in determining how
the myths and realities of history will be told.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/02/education/02LESS.html
October 2, 2002
By RICHARD ROTHSTEIN
THE Texas Board of Education will soon decide which history
textbooks may be used in the state. Activists on the left
and right are lobbying the board, to influence its choices.
One text has already been withdrawn because it referred to
prostitution in frontier towns. A board member felt this
was inappropriate for high school students to read.
A group called the Texas Public Policy Foundation has
attacked the simplistic glorification of minority groups
that is now conventional in American education.
The foundation wants texts modified to tell how African
chieftains, not Europeans, captured slaves for sale in
America. It wants to emphasize the role of white Europeans
in ending slavery. It objects to portrayals of President
John F. Kennedy and Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy as
civil rights supporters, noting that the brothers refused
to support the movement at crucial times.
The group also wants texts to say that the Constitution
protects an individual's right to own guns and that the
wealthy pay a disproportionate share of income taxes.
American publishers sell hundreds of millions of dollars
worth of social studies texts each year. Texas is the
second-largest buyer in that market, after California.
Because issuing separate editions for each state is
expensive, changes required by Texas will affect texts
everywhere.
There is nothing new about this. As Frances FitzGerald
noted in her 1979 book, "America Revised," since the 1950's
"New England children, whose ancestors heartily disapproved
of the Mexican War, have grown up with heroic tales of Davy
Crockett and Sam Houston" - not because historians felt the
war was justified but to appease Texans who decided if
books were acceptable.
Nor is Texas the only place where schoolbooks have been
pawns in adult political fights.
A new book by Jonathan Zimmerman, "Whose America?" (Harvard
University Press, 2002), develops Ms. FitzGerald's themes.
Dr. Zimmerman shows how early 20th-century texts described
the American Revolution as a complex event, including class
conflict between propertied and poor colonists. Antagonism
of colonists toward England was played down, and support
for independence by some Englishmen was highlighted.
Dr. Zimmerman says this treatment partly resulted from
growing numbers of immigrants in schools at the time.
Educators aimed to get children "Americanized," defined as
adopting Anglo-Saxon culture and identity. Demonization of
King George III would have undermined this goal.
The perspective was reversed in the 1920's as newly
powerful Irish immigrant leaders demanded a more
anti-British stance. William H. Thompson, Chicago's
Irish-American mayor, had the city's school superintendent
dismissed for using "treasonous" pro-British texts.
The country's most popular history textbook was then
revised to remove descriptions of protesters against the
Stamp Act as a "mob" and of Boston Massacre victims as
"ruffians." In New York City, politicians demanded that
books portray the Revolution as a crusade of other
nationalities against the British. Minor revolutionary
figures like the Poles Thaddeus Kosciusko and Casimir
Pulaski, the Jew Haym Solomon, the Frenchman the Marquis de
Lafayette and the German Friedrich von Steuben became
heroes in the curriculum. This multicultural fable remains
a staple of history texts.
Today's books, and standardized tests issued by the same
publishers, not only portray each minority as heroic, but
every group (and each sex) is airbrushed to eliminate the
possibility of stereotyping.
Portrayals of African-Americans as maids or athletes
(except for Jackie Robinson), of women as housewives, of
Mexicans as farm laborers or of Jews as businessmen are not
permitted. This ensures that books and tests pass muster
without objection from officials in Texas and other states
that also allow schools to buy only approved texts.
Are books now more bland and mythical than before? Perhaps
not, but they may be more dangerous. In the past, some
states, districts could dissent and use books with
different slants from the one in fashion. Teachers who had
historical sophistication could add their own materials or
ignore the texts altogether.
But today, curriculums are more standardized, especially as
we measure all students with similar tests. On the one
hand, policy makers want teachers to have more knowledge in
the subjects they teach and more skill in deciding how to
teach them. On the other, teachers have less freedom to
design their lessons.
It is unclear which tendency will prevail. But if
standardization wins out, political fights like the one in
Texas will become ever more influential in determining how
the myths and realities of history will be told.