James W. Loewen

This national best-seller is an entertaining, informative, and sometimes shocking expose of the way history is taught to American students. Lies My Teacher Told Me won the American Book Award and the Oliver Cromwell Cox Award for Distinguished Anti-Racist Scholarship.James W. Loewen, a sociology professor and distinguished critic of history education, puts 12 popular textbooks under the microscope-and what he discovers will surprise you. In his opinion, every one of these texts fails to make its subject interesting or memorable. Worse still is the proliferation of blind patriotism, mindless optimism and misinformation filling the pages.From the truth about Christopher Columbus to the harsh reality of the Vietnam War, Loewen picks apart the lies we've been told. This audiobook, narrated by Brian Keeler (The Hurricane, "All My Children") will forever change your view of the past.

Examines more than one hundred sites that promote incorrect interpretations of American history and raises questions about what Americans choose to commemorate. Reprint. 75,000 first printing.

Bestselling author of Lies My Teacher Told Me , James W. Loewen, exposes the secret communities and hotbeds of racial injustice that sprung up throughout the twentieth century unnoticed, forcing us to reexamine race relations in the United States.In this groundbreaking work, bestselling sociologist James W. Loewen, author of the national bestseller Lies My Teacher Told Me , brings to light decades of hidden racial exclusion in America. In a provocative, sweeping analysis of American residential patterns, Loewen uncovers the thousands of “sundown towns”—almost exclusively white towns where it was an unspoken rule that blacks could not live there—that cropped up throughout the twentieth century, most of them located outside of the South. These towns used everything from legal formalities to violence to create homogenous Caucasian communities—and their existence has gone unexamined until now. For the first time, Loewen takes a long, hard look at the history, sociology, and continued existence of these towns, contributing an essential new chapter to the study of American race relations.Sundown Towns combines personal narrative, history, and analysis to create a readable picture of this previously unknown American institution all written with Loewen’s trademark honesty and thoroughness.

In this follow-up to his landmark bestseller, Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong, Loewen once again takes history textbooks to task for their perpetuations of myth and their lack of awareness of todays multicultural student audience (not to mention the astonishing number of facts they just got plain wrong). How did people get here? Why did Europe win? In Teaching What Really Happened, Loewen goes beyond the usual textbook-dominated social studies course to illuminate a wealth of intriguing, often hidden facts about Americas past. Calling for a new way to teach history, this book will help teachers move beyond traditional textbooks to tackle difficult but important topics like conflicts with Native Americans, slavery, and racial oppression. Throughout, Loewen shows time and again how teaching what really happened not only connects better with all kinds of students, it better prepares those students to be tomorrows citizens.

At last! The long-awaited graphic version of the multi-million copy bestselling corrective to American history myths—adapted by the famed National Book Award–winning artist behind John Lewis’s March trilogySince its first publication in the 1990s, Lies My Teacher Told Me has become one of the most important and successful—and beloved—history books of our time. As the late Howard Zinn said, “Every teacher, every student of history, every citizen should read this book.” Having sold well over 2 million copies, the book also won an American Book Award and numerous other commendations and prizes and was even heralded on the front page of the New York Times long after its first publication. Now, the brilliant and award-winning artist Nate Powell—the first cartoonist ever to win a National Book Award—has adapted Loewen’s classic work into a graphic edition that perfectly captures both Loewen’s text and the irreverent spirit of his work. Eye-popping illustrations bring to life the true history chronicled in Lies My Teacher Told Me , and ample text boxes and callouts ensure nothing is lost in translation. The book is perfect for those making their first foray past the shroud of history textbooks, and it will also be beloved by those who had their worldviews changed by the original.

"This course is designed to enlighten and encourage you to consider the factual basis of many of our most-cherished yet glossed-over stories and the real-life characters who populate them. From archaeological misinformation to investigations into the nature of modern public policy, Professor Loewen challenges you to consider the history of what "was" rather than what has been told by standard teaching methods and textbooks"--Container.

Provides a history of Chinese Americans living in the Mississippi Delta region.

PORTABLE PROFESSOR TM is a series of exciting and informative lectures recorded by some of today's most renowned university and college professors. Each course introduces listeners to fascinating, and sometimes startling, insights into the intellectual forces that shape our understanding of the world. Each package includes 14 riveting lectures presented by notable professors as well as a book-length course guide.The study of the past is supposed to help us make sense of our place in history and inform the choices we make every day. But what if the lessons we were taught in American History class were not true? In this eye-opening and provocative series of lectures, renowned historian James W. Loewen, author of Lies My Teacher Told Me, unravels the fact from the fiction, the unvarnished truths from the convenient myths, and explains the reasons American history has so often been distorted.COURSE LECTURES Why Study the Past? Archaeology and Prehistory The Politics and History of Columbus Pilgrims Native American Societies and Cultures The Making and Use of the Constitution Slavery The Civil War The Civil War (Continued) and Reconstruction The Nadir of Race Relations The Nadir of Race Relations (Continued) United States Foreign Policy Capitalism and Social Class Doing History Yourself James W. Loewen holds a Ph.D. in sociology from Harvard University and has been a lecturer on the subject of race relations for a quarter century. He is the author of numerous books, including Lies Across America: What Our Historic Sites Get Wrong and the best-selling Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your High School History Textbook Got Wrong, which won the American Book Award, the AESA Critics' Choice Award, and the Oliver Cromwell Cox Award for Distinguished Ant-Racist Scholarship, and upon which this course is based.

Up a Creek, With a Paddle is an intimate and often humorous memoir by the author of Lies My Teacher Told Me , James W. Loewen, who holds the distinction of being the best-selling living sociologist today. Rivers are good metaphors for life, and paddling for living. In this little book, Loewen skillfully makes these connections without sermonizing, resulting in nuggets of wisdom about how to live, how to act meaningfully, and perhaps how to die. Loewen also returns to his life’s work and gently addresses the origins of racism and inequality, the theory of history, and the ties between the two. But mostly, as in his life, he finds rueful humor in every canoeing debacle—and he has had many!

A posthumous book by the bestselling author of Lies My Teacher Told Me, sharing the strategies and secrets of an award-winning, fifty-year career as a college professorIn addition to being a bestselling author, James W. Loewen was a prizewinning educator, with a career spanning over half a century at institutions including Tougaloo College, Harvard University, the University of Vermont, and the Catholic University of America. Loewen was beloved by his students and won many “best teacher” awards. He had an unusual passion for teaching and took the job very seriously. How to Teach College is a brilliant distillation of his educational wisdom that will be of interest to many generations of teachers to come, as well as to the millions of fans of Loewen’s other books. It encompasses advice both epic (how to convey a love of one’s topic and motivate students to become lifelong higher learners) and technical (how to plan and manage the classroom, syllabi, lectures, tests, grading, and more)—all drawing on firsthand stories and anecdotes from Loewen’s own courses on sociology and race relations. With a special emphasis on reaching students from diverse backgrounds and how to teach potentially difficult subjects—particularly relevant in these times—the book comes to us in Loewen’s vibrant, original, and inimitable voice. It will be a lasting part of his legacy and a great gift to a new generation of college (and some high school) teachers. The manuscript was edited by Loewen’s son, Nick Loewen, a longtime high school teacher, and sociology professor Michael Dawon, with whom Loewen shared an early draft.

A textbook which traces the history of Mississippi from prehistoric times until today, covering all areas of social life and concentrating on recent developments, especially the civil rights struggle and the search for social justice.

A posthumous book by the bestselling author of Lies My Teacher Told M e, sharing the strategies and secrets of an award-winning, fifty-year career as a college professor“Not a few professors teach solely because they have to, to hold a position that lets them do what they really want to do, which is ‘their work’—their research, their writing. … Those professors miss the joys of teaching.”—from the introduction to How to Teach College Widely known as the bestselling author of Lies My Teacher Told Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong, James W. Loewen, who passed away in 2021, was a leading sociologist of race relations and a prizewinning college educator. With a teaching career spanning over half a century at Tougaloo College, Harvard University, University of Vermont, and Catholic University, Loewen taught the way he with creativity, humor, and a high expectation that students can handle the truth.How to Teach College is an invaluable resource for professors teaching in increasingly fraught American classrooms. With a special emphasis on teaching students from diverse backgrounds and potentially controversial subjects, this posthumously published book comes to us in Loewen’s vibrant, original, and inimitable voice. In it, he offers advice from the epic (how to convey a love of one’s topic and motivate students to become lifelong learners) to the technical (how to design a syllabus, manage the classroom, testing and grading)—all drawing on firsthand anecdotes from his own courses on sociology and race relations.Edited by Loewen’s son, Nicholas Loewen, a longtime high school teacher, and sociology professor Michael Dawson, How to Teach College is sure to inspire generations of teachers to come.“How to Teach College is a 'cookbook' of over one hundred (I counted!) practical lessons, techniques, tricks, and gimmicks that Jim learned in his fifty-year career as a college teacher. It provides a clear road map that will make teaching easier, more effective, and more rewarding for students and professors alike. While it speaks directly to teachers, I hope that educational leaders at every level will read—and absorb—this brilliant, eminently sensible, and highly readable book.”—John Merrow, former PBS Education correspondentThis audiobook contains a supplemental PDF.PLEASE When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.