We mourn the loss of our friend and colleague and remain committed to the work he began.
Best-Selling Book by a Living (as of 2020) Sociologist! High school students hate history. When they list their favorite subjects, history always comes in last. They consider it the most irrelevant of 21 school subjects; bo-o-o-oring is the adjective most often applied. James Loewen spent two years at the Smithsonian Institute surveying twelve leading high …
Banquet Address, Mississippi Historical Society February, 2007 In February, 2007, the Mississippi Historical Society invited me to be their annual banquet speaker. To me this was significant, because the society had played no role in 1974, when the State Textbook Board had rejected our book, Mississippi: Conflict and Change. As a result, for an entire …
Because there were thousands of sundown towns and suburbs in the United States, I have not been able to confirm them all. I hope this website helps to nurture a genre of “sundown studies,” because much remains to be investigated. The sheer extent of the problem needs study. Did a given town or county develop …
Owing to what sociologists call “neolocal residence,” there is no geographic or historical mooring for the Loewen family. I chose the cemetery in Mountain Lake, Minnesota, because it’s beautiful, because I do value my Mennonite heritage, and because my parents’ ashes are there. Loewen valued his children, Bruce Nicholas Loewen and Lucy Loewen McMurrer, whom …
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 …
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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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 …
In K-12 Schools Using Lies My Teacher Told Me and Teaching What Really Happened Teaching with Lies My Teacher Told Me and Teaching What Really Happened is much more fun than just plugging away at the textbook. Textbook Problems One reason why U.S. history gets liked least is because it is more dominated by the …
James W. Loewen Loewen is proudest of his contributions to American society in five areas: his children, who he thinks are forces for good; his physical impact on the landscape, mostly in the form of housing he built and trees he planted; his writings; his direct efforts at social change; and his deployment of money …
History and Social Justice Inspired by James W. Loewen, sociologist, historian, citizen. Telling the truth about the past helps cause justice in the present. Achieving justice in the present helps us tell the truth about the past. James W. Loewen (1942-2021) We mourn the loss of our friend and colleague and remain committed to the …