Lies My Teacher Told Me Analysis

Textbooks are a great source of information and are a great resource when learning the basics about various topics. We depend on textbooks quite often to teach us, and we put forth a certain trust in them that they are presenting accurate and thorough information. What if I was to tell you the textbooks lie! History textbooks in matter of fact tend to leave out a lot of information, and present an American bias throughout the readings. This bias is known as American exceptionalism. According to Wikipedia, “American exceptionalism is an ideology that holds that the United States is unique among nations in a positive way, particularly with respect to its ideals of democracy and personal freedom.” Textbooks tend to place America on the podium,

The readers are told from the textbook that, “A religious revival among the indians magnified feelings of antagonism toward the British” (Cohen 139). The book fails to acknowledge the importance of the Native religion, and fails to show respect towards it. “The beliefs seem like make-believe, not the sophisticated theology of a higher civilization” (Lies My Teacher Told Me). This differing view caused several attacks to be triggered which is known as Pontiac’s Rebellion. The textbook makes it seem as if these events were well deserved on the Native’s end, and that by believing in a different religion prompted inhumane slaughterings and warfare. The textbook also fails to mention how the harsh press of Christianity made the Natives feel when in reality the indians were rightly angered. Presenting Christianity in an angering manner would be deemed “offensive”. The reader can interpret that the textbook believes that the only proper religion is Christianity, and that the actions the British and the colonists enacted were

When focusing on the relationship between the Natives and the British/settlers, we seem to think the Natives are in the wrong for a majority of things. We picture the Natives as the ones who were the aggressors which allow us mentally to provide acceptance to how we treated them. The truth however, is the settlers and the british are at wrong, and readers of The American Promise do not get this vibe. This connects back to the idea of American exceptionalism, and how the textbook only wants the readers to think of the positives, and that the American people are never at fault. When looking at the difference between how the primary sources and the textbook addressed slavery we see the same pattern. The textbook did not want the readers to know the true horror in which we put slaves through in order to keep the exceptionalism mind set. By just reading the textbook, and not referring to other sources the reader is hurting himself, and missing out on other key perspectives which can change the way which we view history as well as our