Protestantism

» Brian Tubbs - Teaching History in The U.S.A.

This is an extremely controversial subject. Hard to address in a simple post. I'll make just a few comments here.

1. History is what it is - and I don't think it's appropriate to revise or change history in order to accommodate an agenda (whether that be nationalism or multiculturalism). People on both sides need to be aware of this.

2. The rebellion against the "great men" approach to history has, in my view, led us to the other extreme - one easily seen in the writings of people like Howard Zinn. The FACT of the matter is that some very great men exerted ENORMOUS influence over the course of our history. Whether that's popular or not - or right or not - doesn't change reality. That's the way it is.

3. It's abominable that some states, in adopting standards proposed by the likes of Nash, Crabtree, and Dunn have deemphasized (and sometimes outright ignored) the contributions made by George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, et al in order to emphasize other aspects or peoples in history. In the case of GW, for example, no one (of any race, gender, or color) comes anywhere close to the impact he had on America - and that's just the way it is.

4. Lastly, I've read through Zinn's "A People's History of the United States" - and I can tell you that the outcome or product of this approach to history is typically to emphasize exploitation, oppression, etc. - and, almost always, a leftist slant on history. Never is there really an effort to talk about the common person per se. Zinn doesn't spend a lot of time for example on the middle class. No, what these historians often mean (if not ALWAYS mean) is the lower class and minority groups. Is it wrong to talk about them? Absolutely not. But to emphasize them to the point that the majority is ignored or disproportionately downplayed, I think we start to have a problem. I have found that Zinn's approach is every bit as agenda-biased as what he claims is the case with the traditional approach to history.