![]() The book has racked up many awards and sold around 2 million copies since it was first published in 1995. ![]() In doing so, Lies My Teacher Told Me overturned one assumption embedded in the history classes I'd been sitting through all my life: that the United States is constantly ascending from greatness to greatness. It introduced me to concepts that still help me make sense of the world, like the "racial nadir" - the downturn in American race relations, starting after Reconstruction, that saw the rise of lynchings and the Ku Klux Klan. ![]() Lies My Teacher Told Me, by James Loewen, explained how history textbooks got the story of America wrong, usually by soft-pedaling, oversimplifying and burying the thorny drama and uncertainties of the past under a blanket of dull, voice-of-God narration. Slim in contrast to our hulking required textbook, it was a funny, compelling, even shocking read. When I was a high school junior in New Orleans taking AP American history, my teacher assigned us a paperback book. ![]() Your purchase helps support NPR programming. Close overlay Buy Featured Book Title Lies My Teacher Told Me Subtitle Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong Author James W. ![]()
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