Lies My Alabama History Book Told Me: Part 2 - Why Slavery Wasn't So Bad

This is important stuff (4.00 / 3)

And thank you for revealing this.

My education was in the Nawth, but I never saw a Black teacher or professor until I was in graduate school in NYC in the late 60s.  (Probably 1967.  And he was a visiting professor--the great Eric C. Lincoln.

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by: Doggone @ Thu Feb 03, 2011 at 01:25:34 AM UTC

The dominant attitudes of the times really are "preserved in amber" in these old textbooks (4.00 / 3)

Because history and civics school books are all about indoctrinating kids that the world the way it is is just, righteous, and the good guys always win. 

So the emphasis in the books is a strong clue about what publishers, state school boards, and the elites they served were most worried about.

My guess is that in 1941, Brown vs. Board of Education and an integrated military was undreamed of.  But in 1961, both of these events had happened, and white supremacy was fighting back. 

Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.
- John Adams

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by: herding old cats @ Thu Feb 03, 2011 at 01:51:23 AM UTC

that's my thought as well (4.00 / 2)

I was really surprised at how "moderate" the 1941 book seemed compared to the 1961 version.  Of course, the 1941 book does have quite a laudatory section on the KKK and how they took care of "troublemakers."

Reading them, I can't help but wonder what people will think of our history and civics books in 60 years!

"The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness."  - John Kenneth Galbraith

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by: countrycat @ Thu Feb 03, 2011 at 02:26:55 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Here's the thing with history/civics books (4.00 / 3)

Most adults have no idea what's in them.  So a small group of folks with a well organized agenda can put all kinds of BS into textbooks with very few repercussions.  Look what the Texas Board of Education has done -- to the whole country.  And when it comes to state history books, every state holds sovereign sway over what gets into them.

What happened in Alabama between 1941 and 1961?  Let's use George Wallace as an example.

... in May 1946, he won his first election as a member to the Alabama House of Representatives. At the time, he was considered a moderate on racial issues. As a delegate to the 1948 Democratic National Convention, he did not join the Dixiecrat walkout at the convention, despite his opposition to President Harry S. Truman's proposed civil rights program ...  In 1953, he was elected Circuit Judge in the Third Judicial Circuit of Alabama. ... He gained a reputation for fairness regardless of the race of the plaintiff...

...

He was defeated by John Patterson in Alabama's Democratic gubernatorial primary election in 1958 ... Patterson ran with the support of the Ku Klux Klan, an organization Wallace had spoken against, while Wallace was endorsed by the NAACP. After the election, aide Seymore Trammell recalled Wallace saying, "Seymore, you know why I lost that governor's race?... I was outniggered by John Patterson. And I'll tell you here and now, I will never be outniggered again."

It's clear that attitude toward race became a major political discriminator in the period between your two different history books.  My own theory is that it just wasn't a big discriminator in political elections as long as everything was going along smoothly, the way it always had ... folks with liberal attitudes toward others were tolerated because they weren't making a lot of waves.  But once desegregation efforts took off, the intolerant people got mad, much like the Tea Party today.  They used all tools at their disposal to squash those liberal attitudes ... and one of the most natural was propaganda in textbooks.  I wonder if there was a lot of similar propaganda in newspapers and periodicals as well, or if those were tougher nuts to crack?

 

Work harder and work smarter!

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by: mooncat @ Thu Feb 03, 2011 at 03:54:26 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Just goes to show (4.00 / 3)

literate white folk may have been more dangerous than the ignant ones.

I dont feel safe in the United States of America, never have.  The discussion of the indoctrination done through school books, and still going on, made this country unsafe for the other.

What are the text books like now? 

 

Qui bibit, dormit; qui dormit, non peccat; qui non peccat, sanctus est; ergo qui bibit sanctus est.

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by: SaintSatinStain @ Fri Feb 04, 2011 at 01:59:54 AM UTC

Today's textbooks (0.00 / 0)

That's a great question and one I'm hoping to check out.  We homeschooled for a while, so the young cone didn't get Alabama history.  I'm thinking though that it's possible to call the school or administrative office and ask to look at the textbooks.

I will say that the 11th grade AP American History book is great.  It's written in a narrative style that's actually fun to read and challenges students to question issues and do research on their own.  A far cry from the dry as dust stuff I remember.

"The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness."  - John Kenneth Galbraith

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by: countrycat @ Fri Feb 04, 2011 at 13:50:58 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Of course (0.00 / 0)

It explains why so many of the Babyboomer generation does exactly like the O'Jays song "Smiling Faces" towards blacks.  

All I'm going to say is being black in this nation is a liability, but being black in the South is just a burden. 

"Hypocrites are those whom pick and choose prejudices while giving accolades for their own..."

"It is what it is."  

http://blkindependent.blogspot...

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by: kayman @ Sat Feb 05, 2011 at 03:55:13 AM UTC