Some myths don't die, and lies are still being told about Christopher Columbus: that he "discovered" the Americas (not only was the land familiar to native inhabitants, but it had also been visited before by Europeans), that the land was sparsely populated by native people (there were fourteen million inhabitants in 1492), that those people were primitive (Europeans learned a lot and gained technology and agricultural skill from Native Americans), and that they submitted to Columbus's "God-like" authority (they submitted to the deadly smallpox and bubonic plague that Columbus's crew imported from Europe).
"Lies My Teacher Told Me About Christopher Columbus" disproves the myths about Columbus still enshrined in American textbooks with quotations from primary source material that sets the record straight. The poster and accompanying 48-page paperback book sum up the mistellings--and reveal the real story--in a graphically appealing and accessible format that shows the degree to which textbooks have "lied" by knowingly substituting crowd-pleasing myths for grim and gruesome historical evidence.

Resounding documentary proof that the original reasoning behind secession and subsequent myth-making was in defense of slavery and white supremacy Most Americans hold basic misconceptions about the Confederacy, the Civil War, and the actions of subsequent neo-Confederates. For example, two-thirds of Americans--including most history teachers--think the Confederate States seceded for "states' rights." This error persists because most have never read the key documents about the Confederacy. The 150th anniversary of secession and civil war provides a moment for all Americans to read these documents, properly set in context by award-winning sociologist and historian James W. Loewen and coeditor Edward H. Sebesta, to put in perspective the mythology of the Old South. When South Carolina seceded, it published "Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union." The document actually opposes states' rights. Its authors argue that Northern states were ignoring the rights of slave owners as identified by Congress and in the Constitution. Similarly, Mississippi's "Declaration of the Immediate Causes . . ." says, "Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery--the greatest material interest of the world." Later documents in this collection show how neo-Confederates obfuscated this truth, starting around 1890. The evidence also points to the centrality of race in neo-Confederate thought even today and to the continuing importance of neo-Confederate ideas in American political life. James W. Loewen, Washington, D.C., is the best-selling author of Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong and Lies Across America: What Our Historic Sites Get Wrong. He is also the author of Teaching What Really Happened: How to Avoid the Tyranny of Textbooks; Sundown Towns: A Hidden Dimension of American Racism; Social Science in the Classroom; and Mississippi: Conflict and Change. He is professor emeritus at the University of Vermont. Edward H. Sebesta, Dallas, Texas, is a coeditor of Neo-Confederacy: A Critical Introduction. His articles have appeared in numerous journals.

Since its first publication in 1995, Lies My Teacher Told Me has become one of the most important - and successful - history books of our time, having sold nearly two million copies. In Lies My Teacher Told Me, James W. Loewen brings history alive in all its complexity and ambiguity. Beginning with pre-Columbian history and ranging over events as diverse as the first Thanksgiving, the My Lai massacre, 9/11, and the Iraq War, Loewen offers an eye-opening critique of existing textbooks and delivering a wonderful retelling of American and Western history as it should - and could - be taught.

Lies My Teacher Told Me is one of the most important and successful American history books of our time. Now Rebecca Stefoff turns Loewen's beloved work into Lies My Teacher Told Me for Young Readers. Beginning with pre-Columbian American history and then covering characters and events as diverse as Helen Keller, the first Thanksgiving, the My Lai massacre, 9/11, and the Iraq War, Loewen's lively, provocative telling of American history is a 'counter-textbook that retells the story of the American past' (The Nation). Readers will welcome and value its honesty, its humour, and its integrity.

In this groundbreaking work, sociologist James W. Loewen, author of the classic 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 weren't welcome - that cropped up throughout the twentieth century, most of them located outside of the South.

Since its first publication in 1995, Lies My Teacher Told Me has become one of the most important - and successful - history books of our time. Having sold over two million copies, the book also won an American Book Award and the Oliver Cromwell Cox Award for Distinguished Anti-Racist Scholarship and was heralded on the front page of the New York Times in the summer of 2006. For this new edition, Loewen has added a new introduction that shows how inadequate history courses in high school help produce adult Americans who think Donald Trump can solve their problems.

From the author of the national bestseller Lies My Teacher Told Me, a completely updated - and more timely than ever - version of the myth-busting history book that focuses on the inaccuracies, myths, and lies on monuments, statues, national landmarks, and historical sites all across America. In Lies Across America, James W. Loewen continues his mission, begun in the award-winning Lies My Teacher Told Me, of overturning the myths and misinformation that too often pass for American history.

The award-winning look at an ugly aspect of American racism by the bestselling author of Lies My Teacher Told Me, reissued with a new preface by the author. In this groundbreaking work, sociologist James W. Loewen, author of the classic 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 weren't welcome - that cropped up throughout the twentieth century.

Most Americans hold basic misconceptions about the Confederacy, the Civil War, and the actions of subsequent neo-Confederates. For example, two thirds of Americans--including most history teachers--think the Confederate States seceded for "states' rights." This error persists because most have never read the key documents about the Confederacy.

These documents have always been there. When South Carolina seceded, it published "Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union." The document actually opposes states' rights. Its authors argue that Northern states were ignoring the rights of slave owners as identified by Congress and in the Constitution. Similarly, Mississippi's "Declaration of the Immediate Causes " says, "Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery--the greatest material interest of the world."

Later documents in this collection show how neo-Confederates obfuscated this truth, starting around 1890. The evidence also points to the centrality of race in neo-Confederate thought even today and to the continuing importance of neo-Confederate ideas in American political life. The 150th anniversary of secession and civil war provides a moment for all Americans to read these documents, properly set in context by award-winning sociologist and historian James W. Loewen and co-editor, Edward H. Sebesta, to put in perspective the mythology of the Old South."

Collected in this volume are the best articles and symposia from Poverty & Race, the bimonthly newsletter journal of The Poverty & Race Research Action Council (PRRAC), a Washington, DC-based national public interest organization founded in 1990. Poverty & Race in America includes over six-dozen works originally published between mid-2001 and 2005, many of which have been updated and revised. The contributors represent the best of progressive thought and activism on America's two most salient, and seemingly intractable, domestic problems-race and poverty. Divided into topical sections, this volume considers the issues of race, poverty, housing, education, health, and democracy. Poverty & Race in America is especially concerned with the links between and among these areas, both for purposes of analysis and policy prescriptions. Featuring a foreword by Congressman Jesse L. Jackson, Jr., this edited collection will be of great interest to policy makers and human rights activists and hopefully stimulate creative thought and action to bring an end to racism and poverty.

Collected in this volume are the best articles and symposia from Poverty & Race, the bimonthly newsletter journal of The Poverty & Race Research Action Council (PRRAC), a Washington, DC-based national public interest organization founded in 1990. Poverty & Race in America includes over six-dozen works originally published between mid-2001 and 2005, many of which have been updated and revised. The contributors represent the best of progressive thought and activism on America's two most salient, and seemingly intractable, domestic problems-race and poverty. Divided into topical sections, this volume considers the issues of race, poverty, housing, education, health, and democracy. Poverty & Race in America is especially concerned with the links between and among these areas, both for purposes of analysis and policy prescriptions. Featuring a foreword by Congressman Jesse L. Jackson, Jr., this edited collection will be of great interest to policy makers and human rights activists and hopefully stimulate creative thought and action to bring an end to racism and poverty.