People have a right to their own opinions, but not to their own facts. Evidence must be located, not created, and opinions not backed by evidence cannot be given much weight.
James W. LoewenThere's no excuse therefore, for a 1,152 page book. I think we should all be using 300-page paperbacks. These exist.
James W. LoewenVery few college professors want high school graduates in their history class who are simply "gung ho" and "rah-rah" with regard to everything the United States has ever done, have never thought critically in their life, don't know the meaning of the word "historiography" and have never heard of it. They think that history is something you're supposed to memorize and that's about it. That's not what high school, or what college history teachers want.
James W. LoewenThe layout of textbooks, I think, has been done with an assumption that students don't read.
James W. LoewenTextbooks should show that neither morality nor immorality can simply be conferred upon us by history. Merely being part of the United States, without regard to our own acts and ideas, does not make us moral or immoral beings. History is more complicated than that.
James W. LoewenYou go to towns in Massachusetts, Greenfield, first settled in 1686. Wouldnโt it be cool if it said, โGreenfield. First settled c. 13,000 B.P. or approximately 13,000 Before the Present. Resettled.โ Maybe we could say even, โResettled by whites,โ Or, โResettled anyway, 1686.โ It would have a different impact. And of course it would help explain why the town is called Greenfield, because it was a green field and the fields were left by Native people who had already been farming them.
James W. Loewen