James Loewen Debunking History May 12, 2000 Listen Real :: mp3 :: au format :: wav Read Online Session

James Loewen spent two years at the Smithsonian Institution surveying twelve leading high school textbooks of American history. He found an embarrassing blend of bland optimism, blind nationalism, and plain misinformation, weighing in at an average of 888 pages and almost five pounds.

In response, he wrote Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your High School History Textbook Got Wrong, in part a telling critique of existing textbooks, but also a gripping retelling of American history as it should, and could, be taught.

Jim Loewen taught race relations for twenty years at the University of Vermont. Previously he taught at predominantly black Tougaloo College in Mississippi. He now lives in Washington, D.C., continuing his research on how Americans remember their past. Lies Across America: What Our Historic Markers and Monuments Get Wrong came out in 1999.
His other books include Mississippi: Conflict and Change (co-authored), which won the Lillian Smith Award for Best Southern Nonfiction but was rejected for public-school text use by the State of Mississippi, leading to the path-breaking First Amendment lawsuit, Loewen et al. v. Turnipseed, et al. He also wrote The Mississippi Chinese: Between Black and White, Social Science in the Courtroom, and The Truth About Columbus. He attended Carleton College and holds the Ph.D. in sociology from Harvard University.