One Sided Story: Textbook Treatment of Native Americans

Lies My Teacher Told Me by James W. Loewen, Chapter Four (Red Eyes).

If I had to combine what I have learned from James Loewen in chapters two through four, it is that we have a horrible tendency of understating or completely ignoring major issues in our history. It is almost like if we don't put it down in the textbook then we can pretend that it never happened. Thankfully, I think teachers today are beginning to spend less time teaching from the textbook so it may get better in coming years and a more reality-based history can be taught to students. I just want to say that I now am going to make a conscious effort in every unit of study that I teach to find examples of the "other" side of the story. In chapter four, the "other" side would be that of the Native Americans. Like chapter three, the Native perspective is almost entirely ignored by textbooks. Loewen acknowledged that in the last few decades, textbooks are giving better treatment to the Native Americans, but historically American history textbooks have a focus on white people and the European point-of-view rather than a focus on teaching reality. Loewen asserts that "authors of American history textbooks need a crash course in cultural relativism and ethnic sensitivity" (91). After reading the last few chapters of his book, I wholeheartedly agree.

I found this chapter to be a bit lengthy and it makes it a little difficult to sum up. But I was surprised by some of what I read. I didn't know that "the Pilgrims so feared Indianization that they made it a crime for men to wear long hair" or that they made it a crime - punishable by death penalty - for individuals to join Native Americans (101). Also, I was aware that this happened to a certain degree but it was good to see that Loewen spent time addressing how Native Americans became more dependent upon Europeans as time wore on whereas the European became less dependent on Natives. Europeans learned the skills that the Native Americans had to provide them, but after that they needed less and less while the Native Americans became dependent upon the technology that Europeans brought to the area (98). Unfortunately, "not one textbook tells of the process of incorporation into the global economy, none tells how contact worked to deskill Native Americans, most don't tell of increased Indian warfare, and only [one] even hints at the extent of the Native American slave trade" (98). Furthermore, the following quote will stick with me on another aspect that the textbooks missed: "Just as American societies changed when they encountered whites, so European societies changed when they encountered Natives. Textbooks completely miss this side of the mutual accommodation and acculturation process" (99). This is such a big deal. We only see how European life changed by the Natives teaching them agricultural techniques and the like, but we spend no time seeing how the lives of Natives were changed by having to interact with and share with Europeans.

To expand upon this, it is so crucial to be aware that only one side of the story is presented. One quote really stayed with me following the reading because it shows how important context is in portraying reality. "In Vermont the settlers worried about savages scalping them. This description is accurate, provided the reader understands that the settlers were Native Americans, the scalpers were white" (108). When we began to let Hollywood and popular culture educate individuals on what history looked like rather than being honest in our portrayals of history in textbooks, it gave people misconceptions on what actually happened. Hollywood has portrayed this savage stereotype of the Native American and that makes it difficult to erase those stereotypes when textbooks struggle to back us up on it. Textbooks are thankfully getting better about being honest that there was brutality and violence from both sides, but as a whole textbooks "do not challenge our archetypal Laura Ingalls Wilder picture of peaceful white settlers suffering occasional attacks by brutal Indians" (108).

Turning a blind eye to reality does not mean it did not happen. It also does not mean that because it doesn't appear in our textbooks, that people will not find out the truth. Loewen brings up a difficult but incredibly important point: "We also have to admit that Adolf Hitler displayed more knowledge of how we treated Native Americans than American high schoolers who rely on their textbooks. Hitler admired our concentration camps for Indians in the west 'and often praised to his inner circle the efficiency of America's extermination - by starvation and uneven combat' as the model for his extermination of Jews and Gypsies" (118). This hits home. Just because the truth did not make it into our textbooks did not mean that nobody found out what really happened. We need to accept our past as it truly happened so we can learn from it.

To close my analysis of the chapter, there was a quote toward the end that really made me think about my role as an educator. The quote discusses the role of the historian and it makes me think about what I can do as a teacher to make sure that I give voices to those who have been voiceless in textbooks. "'The duty of the historian,' Gordon Craig has reminded us, 'is to restore the past the options it once had.' Craig also pointed out that this is an appropriate way to teach history and to make it memorable" (119). We need to show students that choices were made along the way that led to the events we study. Everybody chose a certain path. They chose not to actively work against being a racist society. They chose not to allow intermarriage that could have potentially lessened the violence and misunderstanding between the groups. It is also a reminder that there are multiple sides to every story and just reading about the European side is not a fair portrayal of history. As a history teacher, I need to make an active effort to shed light on all sides of the story whenever possible.