Schoolbook nation : conflicts over American history textbooks from the Civil War to the present / Joseph Moreau.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Moreau, Joseph, 1967-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Textbook bias--United States--History.

Textbook bias.

Textbooks--Political aspects--United States--History.

Textbooks.

Historiography.

History.

Textbooks--Political aspects.

United States--History--Textbooks.

United States.

United States--History--Study and teaching--Political aspects.

United States--Historiography--Political aspects.

Genre:

Textbooks.

Physical Description:

ix, 403 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm

Other Title:

School book nation

Place of Publication:

Ann Arbor : University of Michigan Press, [2003]

Summary:

Schoolbook Nation challenges the premise that the 1960s were the beginning of the end of the glory days of American history education, as espoused by Frances FitzGerald in America Revised.

In the late twentieth century, Joseph Moreau recounts, cultural commentators such as historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. and politician Newt Gingrich preached that a new identity crisis shook American history in the sixties. The grand unified view of our past gave way, they said, to various interest groups, who dismantled the old national narrative while demanding a more "inclusive" curriculum for their children. But American history, while grand, has never been unified. Delving into more than 100 history books from the last 150 years, Moreau reveals that the efforts of pressure groups to influence the history curriculum are not new; "they are nearly as old as the mustiest textbook... For those who would influence textbooks and teaching -- Protestant elites in the 1870s, Irish-Americans in the 1920s, and conservative politicians today -- the sky has always been falling." Schoolbook Nation offers a history lesson of its own: when the story of the past is written or rewritten, truth is often a victim. With its comprehensive treatment of the subjects of honesty and politics in the teaching of history, this is an essential book on the side of truth in a complex debate.

Contents:

1. From Virtuous Republic to Nation-State 26

2. Negotiating a National Past: Statewide Textbook Adoption and the Legacy of the Civil War 52

3. Rise of the (Catholic) American Nation: United States History in Parochial Schools 92

4. Race and the Limits of Community 137

5. Anglo-Saxonism and the Revolt against the Professors 175

6. Harold Rugg vs. Horatio Alger: Social Class and Economic Opportunity, 1930-1960 219

7. The Narrative "Unravels," 1961-1985: A Story in Three Parts 264.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 383-389) and index.

ISBN:

0472113429

OCLC:

51984892