Current Events > Man, American history education is so bad

(+) Yeah! (+)

I dunno about you guys but in high school my history education was basically "Columbus discovered the new world and was a great hero. The settlers then went to Massachusetts and eventually America took over the world"

I've really gotten into history as an adult and just... What. Columbus was an absolute idiot who went to his grave denying America existed, turned Hispaniola into his personal slave camp, and was sent back in chains to Europe as everyone realized he's a deranged maniac. The Spanish conquered and settled and thrived in the Americas for 100 years before the English made their laughable first attempts

Why is it taught this way?

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American history in a nutshell:
"We rock, everyone else sucks"

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Was your book from the 1950s?

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History is written by the winners.

But more often than not, the winners are complete assholes.

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Why is it taught this way?

Old Italian Americans making him a personality trait for some reason

Njolk posted...

Why is it taught this way?

Because an uneducated country is easier to control.

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It does not help that history teachers tend to be coaches that are just doing it to have something else to do.
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Most of mine consisted of its founding, wars, black history and......that's pretty much it.

I'm not even sure why it's a core su just still in HS.

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Prismsblade posted...

I'm not even sure why it's a core su just still in HS.

"my history education was bad so I think it should be even worse"

Interesting take

UnholyMudcrab posted...

It does not help that history teachers tend to be coaches that are just doing it to have something else to do.

...This isn't how teaching works. You need to have a single-subject credential in history to teach history, and most of the teacher/coaches I know work their ass off to do both jobs well.

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Until like a year ago nobody knew about the Tulsa race massacre.

People still dont know about the Battle of Blair Mountain, and the coal wars.

This year is the 100th anniversary of both, and they involved the first two recorded uses of aerial bombardment on American soil.

It is genuinely awful

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Yeah I feel like we glossed over a lot of world history. I did get a lot of appreciation for nature and Native American history though (grew up in the Pacific Northwest)

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Yeah, my HS had a strong emphasis on covering undergraduate gen ed curriculum so most everything we did was at a 100 or 200 level with some even higher stuff for the seniors. As such, we had an atypically frank and honest exposure to American history from the pre-colonial era up through the Clinton administration. My history teacher could be stodgy old bastard but he knew his stuff, knew how to convey it in an engaging manner (he used a LOT of video aides; I could only imagine what he could have done with today's technology), and wasn't afraid to challenge the sanitized version of history that was in our textbooks. Hell, he practically reveled in it.

That's why despite a literal altercation with him as a freshman, he remains my favorite HS teacher. That honesty was so amazing.


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Shezarr posted...

...This isn't how teaching works. You need to have a single-subject credential in history to teach history, and most of the teacher/coaches I know work their ass off to do both jobs well.

Now, I know it's probably just that my experience was colored by attending a shitty rural Missouri high school, but my history teacher coached baseball and basketball and clearly put more effort into that than teaching. Most days we watched videos or read out of the book while he looked at schedules and stuff, and in the world history class he skipped over every single chapter that wasn't focused on North America or Europe.

No, it's not fair of me to project that onto all history teachers. I shouldn't have said that.

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Yea US History in public school sucks. Also they often repeat shit. I remember going over the same material in multiple grades. I don't know how it was for you but for me, it seemed like we rarely ever made it to ww2 even. Seems like every grade I had to start back at Columbus. We always reached the Civil War near summer. Always frustrated me

Might be why I ended up doing my own history learning when I got older

Njolk posted...

I dunno about you guys but in high school my history education was basically "Columbus discovered the new world and was a great hero. The settlers then went to Massachusetts and eventually America took over the world"

I've really gotten into history as an adult and just... What. Columbus was an absolute idiot who went to his grave denying America existed, turned Hispaniola into his personal slave camp, and was sent back in chains to Europe as everyone realized he's a deranged maniac. The Spanish conquered and settled and thrived in the Americas for 100 years before the English made their laughable first attempts

Why is it taught this way?

Honestly? Because you were in remedial classes. If you were in AP history classes you would have been taught for the tests and expected to have a much broader knowledge of history than that.

There is a general expectation with people that are in lower level courses that what they are taught is going to go in one ear and out the other so what is the point in getting too deep into the history of any specific person or event beyond the shallow stuff.

in elementary school we learned that many slaves willingly fought for the south during the civil war...

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imo it's ok to give young people a generally positive overview of their country, without laying every heavy, unsavory actuality on them. they'll learn it it eventually

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Atralis posted...

Honestly? Because you were in remedial classes. If you were in AP history classes you would have been taught for the tests and expected to have a much broader knowledge of history than that.

There is a general expectation with people that are in lower level courses that what they are taught is going to go in one ear and out the other so what is the point in getting too deep into the history of any specific person or event beyond the shallow stuff.

Part of me wishes I could redo high school and try AP history. I think the me of today could have handled it. But not sure about back then

UnholyMudcrab posted...

Now, I know it's probably just that my experience was colored by attending a shitty rural Missouri high school, but my history teacher coached baseball and basketball and clearly put more effort into that than teaching. Most days we watched videos or read out of the book while he looked at schedules and stuff, and in the world history class he skipped over every single chapter that wasn't focused on North America or Europe.

No, it's not fair of me to project that onto all history teachers. I shouldn't have said that.

I mean I don't doubt that it happens, yeah, and it sucks that you had that experience. Usually I think the ones who want to focus on coaching tend to teach like PE or something, and those who teach content are more into their jobs. I could just be lucky too.

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Atralis posted...

Honestly? Because you were in remedial classes. If you were in AP history classes you would have been taught for the tests and expected to have a much broader knowledge of history than that.

...The division is not "remedial classes or honors." But yes, honors classes are typically going to expose students to a breadth and depth of content that normal classes won't.

ledbowman posted...

imo it's ok to give young people a generally positive overview of their country, without laying every heavy, unsavory actuality on them. they'll learn it it eventually

Shut the fuck up.

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Shezarr posted...

my history education was bad so I think it should be even worse"

Interesting take

History hasn't served me the slightest in life, nor yourself and most others I'm pretty sure. So putting it on the same lv as reading, writing, math and science is utterly lol worthy.

That and history documentary videos are much better overall for learning them.

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"The pilgrims fled to America because they wanted to promote religious freedom "
"The civil war was over taxes and states rights , not slavery "
"We had to nuke Japan or else the Nazis would have won WW2"

US history often feels like that WKUK sketch

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Prismsblade posted...

History hasn't served me the slightest in life, nor yourself and most others I'm pretty sure. So putting it on the same lv as reading, writing, math and science is utterly lol worthy.

That and history documentary videos are much better overall for learning them.

I'd remark on the stunning anti-intellectualism of this post but that's clear from every post you make so it's nothing novel here.

But yes, it's clear you've learned nothing from history.

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Prismsblade posted...

History hasn't served me the slightest in life, nor yourself and most others I'm pretty sure. So putting it on the same lv as reading, writing, math and science is utterly lol worthy.

That and history documentary videos are much better overall for learning them.

Not sure I agree.

People who don't know their history are doomed to repeat it and make really bad decisions

Theres a reason why Trump supporters and conspiracy theorists tend to have very poor educations and lack of historical knowledge. Lack of understanding history leads to ideologies like "Why don't we just build a massive wall?" and "Our army is so strong we can just steamroll a smaller one and insert a new strong government there"

it might not be as quantifiable as learning math and writing, but learning history and more importantly how to understand history is vital to a strong society

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In fact, I'd argue that a knowledge of history is more beneficial to the general populace who don't work on STEM fields than math and science beyond the amount needed to function in daily life.

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i've always wondered why we weren't taught the truth about the civil war; that it was a war orchestrated by the rich ruling classes of the south (the 5% that owned slaves and plantations) and north (the rich and politically powerful that didn't like the southern rich gaining said power). that the poor with no real stake in either side were forced into fighting their proxy war, since the wealthy could just buy their way out...

instead it was 'prettied up' as a fight to end slavery, when in reality racism was pervasive in both the north and south and nobody in politics really gave a flying fuck about slaves beyond how they could use them.

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Prismsblade posted...

History hasn't served me the slightest in life, nor yourself and most others I'm pretty sure. So putting it on the same lv as reading, writing, math and science is utterly lol worthy.

That and history documentary videos are much better overall for learning them.

If you studied your history you'd painfully understand how we continue to make the same mistakes over and over and how nothing ever changes... Because people don't study history

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di0genes posted...

i've always wondered why we weren't taught the truth about the civil war; that it was a war orchestrated by the rich ruling classes of the south (the 5% that owned slaves and plantations) and north (the rich and politically powerful that didn't like the southern rich gaining said power). that the poor with no real stake in either side were forced into fighting their proxy war, since the wealthy could just buy their way out...

instead it was 'prettied up' as a fight to end slavery, when in reality racism was pervasive in both the north and south and nobody in politics really gave a flying fuck about slaves beyond how they could use them.

And this is why history classes are essential folks; so you don't end up like this alt.

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Guns_of_Verdun posted...

Not sure I agree.

People who don't know their history are doomed to repeat it and make really bad decisions

Theres a reason why Trump supporters and conspiracy theorists tend to have very poor educations and lack of historical knowledge. Lack of understanding history leads to ideologies like "Why don't we just build a massive wall?" and "Our army is so strong we can just steamroll a smaller one and insert a new strong government there"

it might not be as quantifiable as learning math and writing, but learning history and more importantly how to understand history is vital to a strong society

Actually, a lot of them are white middle class professionals. But I digress: very few Americans receive anything approaching an adequate education in American history, let alone the history of anywhere or anything else.
A lot of people completely wig out at the mere suggestion that our history is a sordid tale of brutality, elite malfeasance, and impending dissolution.

https://newrepublic.com/article/163096/incoherence-us-history-american-colonies-review
This article is a review of a trilogy of American history books and pretty long, but it's an excellent overview of a few of the very many things we routinely whitewash in American history, and it only goes up until the Civil War!

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This topic reminds me of the time I asked my history teacher why communism was bad. At the time, I didn't understand the politics or history and I just thought communism sounded pretty rad.

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I don't think my school ever taught that Columbus was a hero, luckily. They made him out to be kinda a dick. The only thing they really sanctified him for was "discovering the Americas".

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Shezarr posted...

And this is why history classes are essential folks; so you don't end up like this alt.

tell me how i'm wrong? tell me that the north actually cared about black people. or that the civil war wasn't fought by the poor to benefit the rich.

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di0genes posted...

tell me how i'm wrong? tell me that the north actually cared about black people. or that the civil war wasn't fought by the poor to benefit the rich.

The north was racist too, but the Civil War explicitly started over slavery. The southern states say as much in their secessions.

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Guns_of_Verdun posted...

Not sure I agree.

People who don't know their history are doomed to repeat it and make really bad decisions

Theres a reason why Trump supporters and conspiracy theorists tend to have very poor educations and lack of historical knowledge. Lack of understanding history leads to ideologies like "Why don't we just build a massive wall?" and "Our army is so strong we can just steamroll a smaller one and insert a new strong government there"

it might not be as quantifiable as learning math and writing, but learning history and more importantly how to understand history is vital to a strong society

That's one way of looking at it from a societal standpoint but from a individuals PoT it's relevance falls significantly. Having a encyclopedia books worth of knowledge could be useful every blue moon but for most jobs, sports hobbies and everyday is utterly useless. And if you don't utilize something you're eventually lose it.

And that quote is famous but just because you know history doesn't mean people won't repeat it regardless. Be it in one form or another, intentional or not. From racism, slavery, war, inflation, communism, dictators, genocide.

All are well known to most but they all still happen, somewhere, regardless. It's just a matter of when.

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Shezarr posted...

The north was racist too, but the Civil War explicitly started over slavery. The southern states say as much in their secessions.

The South specifically fighting to preserve slavery is true, yes, but its unfair to say that the average Northerner cared about ending slavery, at least at the beginning of the war. The push to end slavery came from a small group of radical abolitionists, and an influential group of wealthy northern businessmen who opposed slavery for strictly economic reasons (they didnt like the southerners having a free source of labor while they had to pay for theirs, and they knew that having a new supply of labor in the form of newly freed slaves would drive down costs of labor and give them leverage over the budding movement of labor organizers which were beginning to take root in the northern parts of Democratic Party).

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MrToothHasYou posted...

but its unfair to say that the average Northerner cared about ending slavery

Where did I say this?

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For me it was in elementary school they taught the columbus crap then in middle school they pulled a "well actually..." Like we teach me false information in the first place if you are gonna correct it later?

Grandad caused my brothet to fail a history test cause he told him the truth on who discovered America

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American history is teaching people the wrong stuff through most of their time in school, correcting it mid high school, and then just regurgitating the same information until they're blue in the face.

Shezarr posted...

Where did I say this?

Your post heavily implied that the other posters analysis was completely incorrect, when nothing he said was wrong - the economic goals of both the North and South have been subsequently painted over as ideological crusades, either to free the black chattel slave and deliver him into equality, or to preserve the traditions of states rights over centralized government control (or whatever tripe it is the neoconfederates are spouting these days).

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Fuckin 10,000 years of history and Americans are obsessed with a 5 year war

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R_Jackal posted...

correcting it mid high school,

Not even that. Most misinformation doesn't really get corrected until university classes, and most people probably won't take those because their majors lead them somewhere else.

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Prismsblade posted...

Most of mine consisted of its founding, wars, black history and......that's pretty much it.

This. All I remember was "Columbus discovered America, the revolution happened, the Civil War happened, WWII happened, MLK happened."

It's why I've recently decided to take it into my own hands. Started working my way through the Oxford US history collection.

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Shezarr posted...

The north was racist too, but the Civil War explicitly started over slavery. The southern states say as much in their secessions.

yes, the civil war started because of slavery, because slavery was the driving economic force behind the rich southern politicians and the rich northern politicians targeted it for that reason. they did not do it to be altruistic, the northern elite had a very european view on slavery after all, as long as they could profit from it and they didn't see it then it was fine. but unlike a european colony in south america, the southern states had political might that was building because of that slave based economy.

so northern politicians pushed for slavery restrictions, southern politicians started dropping out of the union in response, and to fight the war between the two were the poor and powerless. and at its end, the southern elite still had their wealth though their political power was reduced, the northern elite had won against their enemy, the poor had been culled as is necessary for a functional capitalist economy to maintain itself, and the slaves were still slaves but by another name.

the civil war was yet another facet of the class war we've seen pushed by the political elite for decades. and the ones that write the history books hide this fact behind 'polite fiction' to placate the stupid.

Shezarr posted...

end up like this alt.

aren't you the alt of an alt of an alt? you come from a long line of alts, why cast stones?

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di0genes posted...

aren't you the alt of an alt of an alt? you come from a long line of alts, why cast stones?

This is my one and only account. And I don't hide who my main was, like everyone else on this site for some reason

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Follow up: How many of you actually had a whole course (or even a semester) covering your state's history? Cuz I sure didn't, and I went to a pretty good private school.

ThanksUglyGod posted...

Follow up: How many of you actually had a whole course (or even a semester) covering your state's history? Cuz I sure didn't, and I went to a pretty good private school.

Elementary school and once in middle school.

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ThanksUglyGod posted...

Follow up: How many of you actually had a whole course (or even a semester) covering your state's history? Cuz I sure didn't, and I went to a pretty good private school.

personally i remember one year dedicated to state history, and it was in elementary school. was also the history course where they declared that slaves willingly fought for the south...

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Shezarr posted...

This is my one and only account. And I don't hide who my main was, like everyone else on this site for some reason

burning your way through account after account doesn't change the fact that this is just another alt for you. maybe you should stop pissing off the mods so much and it wouldn't keep happening?

but hey, at least you're proud about it yeah?

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