We mourn the loss of our friend and colleague and remain committed to the work he began.
Resources for Teaching History Creatively Here is a typical table from the US. Census for Indiana. Students may need a little help understanding it, but they can learn a lot from so doing. Help them find the overall population of “Negroes” in Indiana, compared to “Others.” What seems to be happening? Where are the African …
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James W. Loewen (1942-2021) We mourn the loss of our friend and colleague and remain committed to the work he began. For more on his life and work: James W. Loewen, Who Challenged How History Is Taught, Dies at 79, The New York Times HNN Honors James W. Loewen, 1942-2021, History News Network James W. …
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Jim Loewen gives hilarious and gripping talks on topics related to Lies My Teacher Told Me and Lies Across America, how to teach history/social studies better, and Sundown Towns. He is also experienced at leading workshops for in-service teachers, students in schools of education, and staff at historic sites. To have Jim Loewen speak at your community forum, …
James Loewen’s gripping retelling of American history as it should, and could, be taught, Lies My Teacher Told Me, has sold more than 1,500,000 copies and continues to inspire K-16 teachers to get students to challenge, rather than memorize, their textbooks. Jim Loewen taught race relations for twenty years at the University of Vermont. Previously he …
Essay 16: Getting Students Thinking about the Future Recognizing that inaccurate history often subtly promotes continuing white supremacy, the National Education Association (NEA) commissioned these articles and has posted some of them in slightly different form at its website. I thank Harry Lawson and others at NEA for the commission, for editorial suggestions, and for other …
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History Distorts Our Native American Past From sea to shining sea, our public history says quite a bit about Native Americans. Unfortunately, much of it is wrong, Also, our monuments are afflicted by hieratic scale, with Whites on top, Natives below. Historical markers have Whites “discovering” the Great Lakes, “founding” towns taken from American Indians, …
Loewen’s Writing Made a Difference Loewen’s books probably have made his biggest influence. Luke Abaffy interviewed Loewen about his writing years ago; the interview tells something about the overall flow of his work. Loewen’s books, including foreign editions, as of 4/2020 The Mississippi Chinese: Between Black and White Loewen’s first book, The Mississippi Chinese, was …
Slavery, Secession, the Confederacy, Civil War, and Reconstruction This series of eras in the middle of the 1800s have long posed our largest public history problem. This section treats these matters as rendered on the landscape, such as this postcard of Lee Circle, New Orleans. What to Do about Confederate Monuments Most of Loewen’s articles …
Resources for Teaching and Thinking about Public History Using Lies Across America in K-12 and College Other K-12 Uses of Lies Across America Teachers sometimes assign students one or more of the short chapters from LAA. For example, they might assign the Arizona entry to get students thinking about what Americans get wrong about Native …
This happy student became a finalist in the National History Day “exhibits” competition. Sixth graders on Springfield, IL, prompted a new “Race Riot Walking Tour.” Middle-school students in Ohio did award-winning local research on sundown towns for National History Day. A lawyer in DE researched the “Reverse Underground Rail Road” and got two new state …