Calif. Offers Textbook Case of Political Correctness

Fox News ^ | Wednesday, April 30, 2003 | Anita Vogel

[DeuceTraveler]

LOS ANGELES

[baseballfanjm]

I'm homeschooled and get to avoid this, since I doubt where I live, Massachusetts, that things are much better. My sisters are serious historians who love to study the Civil War. I can't imagine how they demolish Civil War history in California now.

[peteram]

"We need to make sure that all ethnicities are represented.

Sure - just like they tried to change history by altering the NY Firefighters flag raising scene at ground zero by erecting an "all-inclusive" memorial depicting the event involving members of all races and walks of life.

[DeuceTraveler]

"Like "1984." Those who control the past, control the future. Those who control the present, control the past. And they did this through revising history. Kind of the former Soviet Union?"

Right on. Revisionist work has always smelled of Communism to me. As a historian it makes me cringe. We need to teach all the facts in history, the good and the bad done by both our forefathers and our opponents with an emphasis on our common American culture of freedom and tolerance.

[luckodeirish]

I'm white, so from now on I would like to be referred to as "pigmentally challenged".

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

To be fair...the term "Framers" was used in schoolbooks when I was a lad decades ago.

[wbill]

Many of the changes seem to represent a direct assault on historical accuracy. For example, the new guidelines dictate Native-Americans should not be depicted with long braids, in rural settings or on reservations. There are no suggestions on how they should be depicted, however. The problem there, say historians, is that some Native-Americans did wear their hair in braids, and generally lived in rural settings before being relocated to reservations.

Heck, if we're revising history, lets go all the way. Let's have a textbook with Native Americans and Mexicans as the winners of the West and condemming European Americans to reservations. Then, ask the kids to resolve the historical discrepancies with what they see today.

Lying a little bit is easy - particularly if the people being lied to don't care. Lying a lot is much harder.

[CatoRenasci]

Save your history texts, high school and college, from the 1950's through the mid-1970's, it's the only way you can get a decent grasp of history.

Perhaps the two most important textbooks you can own, for yourself and your children are:

1. For American History: The Growth of the American Republic, by Samuel Eliot Morison, Henry Steele Commager and William S. Leuchtenberg. Most recent edition 1980, earlier editions back to about 1950, earliest editions are just Morison and Commager. All distinguished historians trained before or just after WWII. New Deal liberals, more or less, of the New England and patriotic variety. Solid mainstream interpretations, if very much "Plymouth Rock" school. You won't get anything better, or nearly as good, in two volumes.

2. For European History: The Making of the Modern World World, by R.R. Palmer, Joel Colton & Lloyd Kramer. Most recent edition 2002, editions back to about 1950. Pre-1970 editions are Palmer alone. Kramer is new with 8th or 9th ed. This is generally considered the best text for a traditional freshman "western civilization" course as taught from the 1920's through the 1980's. Lucidly written and penetrating, it was also used as late as the 1970's by graduate students in European history as the last thing to read before taking exams, to pull all the specialized work together. Nothing better around. Palmer is a distinguished historian of the French revolution and the period preceeding it, and wrote a remarkable book of transatlantic history, The Age of the Democratic Revolution.

[wbill]

As an addendum, the easiest of all is just leaving the truth out. A recent FReeper talked about his daughter's History textbook having one (1!!!) mention of Adolph Hitler, but three pages on Japanese internment during WWII.

People can't question what they don't know......

[NEWwoman]

our forefathers

I was listening to Michael Savage on the way home from work yesterday. He was talking to a lady in New York, who had written a book about words the banned in school text books these days.

One of them was "founding fathers." I'm sure "forefathers" would be included.

[Pompah]

God Bless all Homeschoolers.(May their tribes increase.)

From their ranks will come the leadership that this Great Country will surely need someday.

[LexBaird]

The past 3 generations have grown up believing FDR and Lincoln were great Presidents, beyond reproach, even as their tenures resulted in the deaths of more Americans than all others combined.

You seem to have a fundimental misunderstanding of the concept of "cause and effect". Because two events happen at the same time, it does not mean that one "resulted" in the other.

[DeweyCA]

Savage was talking to Diane Ravitch. She has just written a book. I think it is entitled, "The Language Police".

[JohnGalt]

The Presidents who screwed up the country the least should be the ones we recall fondly where as the ones who preserved the government are the fondest of government schools.

Your attempt to mischaracterize my point is noted.

[zlala]

And if you think grandpa is a senior citizen, guess what? You’re wrong. That’s demeaning, according to the new standards. He is now simply an "older person."

I guess this school district doesn't call it's 12th grade students 'seniors' because it's so demeaning. Just think how the 11th grade student's feel if they're still referred to as 'juniors'. Just disgraceful!
/sarcasm

[D. Brian Carter]

I don't know, but my case of "rain forest fever" just doesn't have the same ring when described this way...

[zlala]

I don't know, but my case of "rain forest fever" just doesn't have the same ring when described this way...

Yeah, poor Spike Lee...life will never be the same for him.

[Myrddin]

This article is a subset of a whole book on the issue. See The Language Police: How Pressure Groups Restrict What Students Learn by Diane Ravitch.

[LexBaird]

The Presidents who screwed up the country the least should be the ones we recall fondly where as the ones who preserved the government are the fondest of government schools.

Your attempt to mischaracterize my point is noted.

As is your attempt to mischaracterize history. Under your theory we should have Garfield and Taylor on Mt. Rushmore.

[Lee'sGhost]

Speaking of George Orwell, wonder how in makes out in this Strange New (smallminded) World?

[JohnGalt]

No, just Washington.