UPDATE: The negative national publicity apparently is causing Virginia to belatedly look at its flawed textbook approval process. Years ago I served on the standards of learning committee for social studies/history and it drove me crazy that non-historians and non-history majors had input on subjects on which they knew nothing. Some things have not changed. The Virginian Pilot has more coverage here.*
The folks in Richmond - i.e., Bob "Taliban Bob" McDonnell, Ken "Kookinelli" Cuccinelli and their appointees - just do not seem to be to keep Virginia out of the news. Once again the state is being depicted as backward and racist in its worship and rewriting of of the history of the Civil War. These guys are the veritable gang that can't shoot straight. Now, the media is having a field day over a 4th grade history text book, Our Virginia, by a non-historian that would have readers believe that there were thousands of black soldiers that fought for the Confederacy. It's not true, but when do the Christianists and far right elements ever worry about actual facts and accurate history. To them, school curriculum is to be warped and shaped into propaganda vehicles to push their own causes and distorted beliefs. In this case, the myth being pushed is that the Civil War was not principally over slavery and that even blacks supported the slave owning society. Among media outlets covering the revisionist history story are the Washington Post, the Virginian Pilot and Salon - and none of the coverage is positive. Here are highlights from the Post which launched the coverage:
*
In its short lesson on the roles that whites, African Americans and Indians played in the Civil War, "Our Virginia" says, "Thousands of Southern blacks fought in the Confederate ranks, including two black battalions under the command of Stonewall Jackson."
*
Historians from across the country, however, said the sentence about Confederate soldiers was wrong or, at the least, overdrawn. They expressed concerns not only over its accuracy but over the implications of publishing an assertion so closely linked to revisionist Confederate history.
*
"It's more than just an arcane, off-the-wall problem," said David Blight, a professor at Yale University. "This isn't just about the legitimacy of the Confederacy, it's about the legitimacy of the emancipation itself."
*
Pulitzer Prize-winning historian James McPherson of Princeton University said, "These Confederate heritage groups have been making this claim for years as a way of purging their cause of its association with slavery."
*
The book also survived the Education Department's vetting and was ruled "accurate and unbiased" by a committee of content specialists and teachers. Five Ponds Press has published 14 books that are used in the Virginia public school system, all of them written by Masoff.
*
As a history major, I have to shudder and wonder about what types of loonies are being appointed to the State Board of Education by Taliban Bob. No doubt all of the vetting of appointees has been turned over to the Christofascsists and closet racists at The Family Foundation.
*
In its short lesson on the roles that whites, African Americans and Indians played in the Civil War, "Our Virginia" says, "Thousands of Southern blacks fought in the Confederate ranks, including two black battalions under the command of Stonewall Jackson."
*
Historians from across the country, however, said the sentence about Confederate soldiers was wrong or, at the least, overdrawn. They expressed concerns not only over its accuracy but over the implications of publishing an assertion so closely linked to revisionist Confederate history.
*
"It's more than just an arcane, off-the-wall problem," said David Blight, a professor at Yale University. "This isn't just about the legitimacy of the Confederacy, it's about the legitimacy of the emancipation itself."
*
Pulitzer Prize-winning historian James McPherson of Princeton University said, "These Confederate heritage groups have been making this claim for years as a way of purging their cause of its association with slavery."
*
The book also survived the Education Department's vetting and was ruled "accurate and unbiased" by a committee of content specialists and teachers. Five Ponds Press has published 14 books that are used in the Virginia public school system, all of them written by Masoff.
*
As a history major, I have to shudder and wonder about what types of loonies are being appointed to the State Board of Education by Taliban Bob. No doubt all of the vetting of appointees has been turned over to the Christofascsists and closet racists at The Family Foundation.
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