Anna Gay 11645814
University of Amsterdam
Masters of Heritage and Memory Masters Thesis
Foundations of Forgetting: A Critical Look at the Misrecollection of an
American History Textbook
Contents
1.0 Introduction 3
2.0 Theoretical Framework
2.1 Critical Discourse Analysis 5 2.2 Theo van Leeuwen’s Theory of the Representation of Social Actors 9
2.2.1 Social Actors in the United States 10 2.3 Heritage Theoretical Framework
2.3.1 Cultural Amnesia 12
2.3.2 Cultural Aphasia 13
3.0 Context for Case Study
3.1 Reconstruction and the Formation of Confederate Heritage 15 3.2 Legal Formations of the Confederate Narrative 18
3.3 Neo-Confederate Influence 19
4.0The Case Study: The TEKS United States History to 1877 textbook by McGraw- Hill
Publishing 21
4.1 Case Study Passage #1 23
4.2 Case Study Passage #2 25
4.3 Case Study Passage #3 29
4.4 Case Study Passage #4 33
4.5 Case Study Passage #5 36
5.0 Dutch Textbooks and social Amnesia 40
5.1 Confederate and Colonial Connections 41
6.0 Education and Social Change 43
7.0 Conclusion 44
Bibliography 46
1.0 Introduction
September 20th, 2018, CNBC reporter Abigail Hess releases a piece entitled “The Texas Board of Education voted to Remove Hillary Clinton and Helen Keller from School Curriculum”. As the title states, the Texas Board of education had taken a preliminary vote in order to “streamline” the curriculum in Texas public schools. According to Hess, the Board of Education asked a group comprised of teachers and other education professionals to rate the importance of historical figures. With Clinton and Keller being given very low scores, this means that they have the potential to be voted out of history in Texas schools . While this article has sparked 1 controversy in the political sphere,with Republicans and Democrats taking sides to either support or condemn the projected decisions, what is truly at stake is the social memory of Texas. Decisions like these do not just have a direct effect on the education of future generations but ,I argue, will have a lasting effect on the heritage landscape of Texas.
This vote brings to the forefront how important education is to the perpetuation of the dominant narrative within a community, or in this case, an entire state. In a study done in 2014 followed by the Washington Post, 43 textbooks were investigated for problems within their pages. Scholars from the Education Fund of the Texas Freedom Network, a group dedicated to combating the Religious Right in the state, have reviewed the textbooks in search of falsities and misrepresentations. In the sources, there were many generalizations and stereotypes of world religions that play into conservative political platforms, but the main concern lies in the legitimization of Neo-Confederate arguments that the American civil war was fought to protect state’s rights, rather than on the basis of slavery. Since the federal structure of education 2 allows for greater choice that individual states can take in the formation and upkeep of their education system, voting to remove concepts and people from history book pages can be done, but not without consequences. It raises the question: What would these changes really mean for Texan communities? Would this be an active act of forced forgetting in the education system? If so, the effects of this forgetting will last longer than the textbooks themselves. The intellectual repercussions of the censorship of history on Texan communities could allow for greater influence of an ill-informed rhetoric.
1Abigail Hess,”The Texas Board of Education voted to remove Hillary Clinton and Helen Keller from
school curriculum.” CNBC, September,20, 2018.
2Valerie Strauss,"Proposed Texas Textbooks Are Inaccurate, Biased and Politicized, New Report Finds." The Washington Post, September 14 ,2014.
From a heritage point of view, the vote and what it proposes to accomplish would be perpetuating a heritage that comes very close to the ideas of the Confederacy era American South. The foundations of these ideas come from a racist discourse and the fundamental idea that one race is superior than the other. In Texas’s Declaration of Causes for Secession,
leaders explicitly stated that “ all white men are and of right ought to be entitled to equal civil and political rights; that the servitude of the African race, as existing in these States, is mutually beneficial to both bond and free…”. The Confederacy focused on the superiority of the white 3 man,and found power in the subordination of enslaved people. The nostalgia for these notions is why the very idea the erasure of politically democratic and female historical figures is being entertained. This decision would keep with the white male political hegemony and will give that institution more agency over education. It is not the first time, nor will it be the last that the Texas education system has posed blatant bias and has placed their main effort to skew American history through textbooks. What we can glean from the Strauss article in the
Washington Post, is that bias has been within the pages of textbooks for years. If bias is still be 4 detected in 2014, it must have a well established place in educational materials.
This case study will use discourse analysis of text to further analyze the socio-political environment of the United States. The discourse to which I will be referring is one that favors the view of the South as the wronged party during the Civil war. The passive language that
surrounds the character of the South perpetuates an identity that puts Confederate heritage in a position to be sympathized with. This sympathy will be an adversary of the truth within
textbooks. Since the 2016 election, Confederate heritage has come to the brighter spotlight because of the culture of racial superiority it symbolizes for white nationalists and the history of racial suppression of Black Americans. As likely as it seems that President Trump’s
controversial words of misogyny and racial superiority sparked the decision to vote out Clinton and Keller from history, education professionals have been using such language in their educational texts since the end of the Civil War. Bias has been detected in textbooks
surrounding the Civil war as far back as the 1870’s. It is important,however,to recognize that 5 such behavior as demonstrated by white nationalists may have been given a wider platform since the 2016 election.
3 “ The Declaration of Causes of Seceding States”, Primary Sources, Accessed January 17, 2019,
https://www.battlefields.org/learn/primary-sources/declaration-causes-seceding-states#Texas.
4 Strauss,"Proposed Texas Textbooks Are Inaccurate, Biased and Politicized, New Report Finds."
5David Yacovone,” Textbook Racism: How Scholars Sustained White Supremacy.” The Chronicle, April 4,
I will strive to highlight the connection between misremembered history and the
misinformed opinions in conservative political circles.I will do so by asking these key questions: How do textbooks play a role in the foundations of American Confederate heritage? In terms of cultural amnesia and cultural aphasia, do textbooks perpetuate social forgetting? I will
investigate these questions through a case study of an American history textbook published for Texas Public Schools:“ Teks United States History to 1877” published by McGraw-Hill School Education. I will be using notions and insights from critical discourse analysis in order to analyze the chapters of the book related to the Civil War. The objective of this will be to read between the lines and fully search for political bias and links to current ideas that social justice
movements are fighting against.
2.0 Theoretical Framework
2.1Critical Discourse Analysis
Critical discourse analysis has been established as a vital method within the heritage studies community by discovering patterns of thought within societies . While discourse 6
analysis can be applied to anything from medicine to tourism, critical discourse analysis aims to find the underlying normative and ideological meanings of texts. Social norms are influenced by the language that is used in any context. Language in turn has a reflexive relationship with reality. According to Vivien Burr and Kenneth Gergen, two main discourse scholars who pioneered the social constructionist approach to discourse analysis, historical specificity is important for the analysis of text. They argue that people are fundamentally historical and
cultural beings and that our worldview is the product of “historically situated interchanges among people”. When looking at education and textbooks through this lens, all of the biased passages 7 are the product of historical and cultural interactions, in our case, the Civil War and subsequent conflicts and the social norms that were born from interactions. Historical specificity in this case is where the politically and racially biased textbooks can be seen as correct by someone who has been taught the biased version of history. These educational tools are being written from a worldview that is correct according to their chosen narrative and are inclusive of bias; but without context of the otherside. With this worldview being the only one that students are being
6 Marianne Jørgenson and Louise Phillips, Discourse Analysis as Theory and Method (London:SAGE Publications, 2002), 1.
given,the historical specificity of the interaction between the two narratives of the Civil War is decided by the interpretation of the discourse by students.As Rebecca Rogers argues, it is important that “education scholars have turned to discourse analysis as a way to make sense of the ways people make meaning in educational texts” .Scrutinizing the bias and meaning that 8 have been integrated into education texts is what creates the criticality of CDA. One of the research questions in a literature review done by Rebecca Rogers, Elizabeth
Malancharuvil-Berkes, Melissa Mosley, Diane Hui, and Glynis O’Garro Joseph from Washington University, is: how do educational researchers use Critical Discourse Analysis? The main use of Critical Discourse, is to not only understand the underlying bias but to show the power dynamics at play through language.
When it comes to discourse studies within the context of textbooks two scholars, Ruth Wodak and Teun Van Dijk, looked intently at the role of discourse studies in the formation of knowledge discourses in history and social science textbooks respectively. In her article “ The Discursive Construction of History” Wodak draws upon theories of social change and the formation of identity politics mainly in Europe. By dealing mainly with trauma in her research in this article, Wodak calls on the theories of Aleida Assman to substantiate her ideas of the construction of historical discourse through violence. Assman herself has differentiated four models in which to understand how societies manage traumatic pasts. The models 9
themselves- dialogic forgetting; remembering in order to prevent forgetting; remembering in order to forget; and dialogic remembering- all have a place within the research of educational texts and social memory, but for them to be accurate and effective in this case study, they need to be used in the frame of certain time periods within American history. However, there is not a natural link between these theoretical models of trauma and discourse.Wodak believes that the link between these two is social change and contextualization . The trauma that was inflicted 10 on the South created a discourse that can only be dismantled through social change. Social change comes from the contextualization of the discourse; which signifies that the recognition of the inaccurate discourse will spur social change for an accurate narrative.
Contextualization is key to placing knowledge in an accurate narrative. Knowledge is pragmatic and relative. Trauma is relative, but not pragmatic. Trauma has a way of taking an
8Rebecca Rogers et al., “Critical Discourse Analysis in Education: A Review of the Literature” Review of Educational Research 74, no. 3 (Autumn 2005): 366.
9 Ruth Wodak, “ The Discursive Construction of History. Brief Considerations” Mots. Les langages du politique, no.94 (November 2010): 60.
event, harboring feelings of fear or pain and claiming it as knowledge in a community. Trauma 11 is also an essential ingredient for fabricating heritage. As stated by the heritage scholar David Lowenthal, we as people elect and exalt our legacy, not by believing it is true, but by feeling it must be right. Trauma as heritage is therefore dogmatic. Teun van Dijk focuses on the 12 knowledge aspect of educational discourse.Van Dijk claims that socio-cultural knowledge in textbooks is presupposed, not learned directly and that presupposed knowledge can very well come from a place of trauma. Knowledge can even be described as a presupposed belief system of a certain community. When linking Wodak and Van Dijk’s work, social change and 13 socio cultural knowledge are the keys to beginning to understand the established knowledge in biased textbooks. This is especially evident if one looks at the model of remembering in order to prevent forgetting and current social activism. Take for example confederate statues in the American South. The argumentation based on social change is for these statues that idealize Confederate soldiers to be removed from public places and moved to locations that provide more context. The context is that in the period after the Civil War in many former Confederate states, these men were seen as heroes for the “ Rebel Cause”. The statues have been seen as important parts of white history in many southern states, however, movements like Black Lives Matter, that protests against the systematic racism against black people, have brought the focus on these statutes as symbolic of racial superiority ideas that have not fully left the South’s memory. What is happening here is almost a war between two of Assman’s models: Remembering in order to prevent forgetting and remembering in order to forget . Placing 14
statues into confederate cemeteries is a reasonable request in order to provide some context on the people idealized and the era of the Civil War in general. More liberal communities have done this in order to remember in order to forget. Since the ideas of the Confederacy are inherently obsolete to diverse communities, these ideas would only create more inequality for diverse communities than they are already facing today. In predominantly black communities, placing the confederacy within context is a step towards forgetting the hardships of enslaved people and a more equal community.
On the other hand, white southerners have made it clear that they believe they do not see the positive aspects of placing the statues in context. To this demographic, the statues are
11 Teun A.Van Dijk and Encarna Atienza, “ Knowledge and discourse in secondary school social science
textbooks.” Discourse Studies 13, no. 1(2011): 98.
12 David Lowenthal,“ Fabricating Heritage” History and Memory 10, no.1(1998): 7.
13 Van Dijk and Atienza, “ Knowledge and discourse in secondary school social science textbooks”, 94. 14 Wodak, “The Discursive Construction of History”,60.
remembering in order to prevent forgetting. They feel as though their personal family histories are being erased because of these statues being removed. As John J. Winberry writes in his article “ Lest We Forget: The Confederate Monument and the Southern Townscape” these Confederate statues are important characterizations of the Southern landscape. Winberry 15 notes a rise in confederate statues being erected in central locations in the 1890s in many southern cities rather than cemeteries. It was the new monuments erected that symbolized an ideological move to an urban setting for these monuments. They represent the Confederate ideas that became central to the view of Southern towns, especially in front of courthouses. So it is only natural for White Southerners to declare the narrative of the Civil War as their known truth as they have made a pattern of placing their history and memory at the seat of law.
Along with this idea, Winberry emphasizes how the symbolism of the monuments came to be, especially to those whose families were soldiers . 16
“The early 1900s constituted a period that was between 35 and 50 years after Appomattox. Age and death were taking their toll of the men who had fought in the war, and people realized that their fathers, brothers, and uncles would soon become vague shadows in
their descendants thoughts. This time factor was explicitly expressed by the monument in Manning, South Carolina: ‘In 1914 when this memorial is erected to the Confederate soldiers when the sun of life of the few who remain hovers in the western horizon…’ The monument was
an attempt to preserve the memories of them and their exploits. ” 17
To the many descendants and survivors of Confederate soldiers, these monuments were there to protect the memory of the men themselves, not necessarily of their ideals.However, this makes it difficult to argue against descendants to prove that the confederate narratives that have been so preserved are in fact inaccurate and ignorant.
As a result, these monuments become complicated in terms of the various heritages that exist within these communities and how they have changed over the years. Winberry calls the South, as depicted in his article, a dichotomous conundrum, which is also accurate when speaking about Confederate heritage and identity in the twenty-first century . When Assman’s 18
15 John. J. Winberry, “ Lest We Forget: the Confederate Monument and the Southern Townscape.” Southeastern Geographer 55, no.1(2015): 20.
16 Winberry, “ Lest We Forget” ,26. 17 Winberry, “ Lest We Forget”,26. 18 Winberry, “ Lest We Forget”, 29.
model of remembering in order to prevent forgetting is applied to this particular societal case, it becomes the foundation of problematic heritage conservation practices.
2.2 Theo van Leeuwen’s Theory of the Representation of Social Actors
In Critical Discourse Analysis, paying specific attention to the use of the English
language and the linguistic structures that both societies and individuals use in order to form an idea is crucial, especially when the are being used for the foundations of a large scale narrative. Theo van Leeuwen’s theory and practice of identifying social actors and their linguistic roles can serve as a map for scholars to find where the narrative is steering. In his paper van Leeuwen 19 lays out a specific discourse on immigration to Australia as a practical illustration of the
categories that make up his model. Drawing from an article, van Leeuwen collects statements that set up the framework for his model, all of which play a role in racial discourse.
Van Leeuwen, in order to set up the categories of representations of social actors, needed to find a discourse that allowed for very clear separation of the social actors. A
discourse that is based on race; is based on the idea of “the other”. An “us v. them” mentality is central because it is a way to justify actions made by social actors that when looked at
objectively would be problematic. Van Leeuwen points to the main ideas which have an opinion on the issue of migration and immigration policy in countries such as France, Japan, and especially in Australia. The opinions that are found in these countries are all being reiterated in the United States today. In the the article itself, these passages and notions are simply listed, without very little context as to what they are specifically referring. Much of the discourse in the United States on immigration revolves around opinions of the severity of immigration on infrastructure. Immigration is a gateway issue to a racist discourse, which can be playing a role in the bias of educational texts.
The first category that van Leeuwen distinguishes in his model, is the inclusion or exclusion of actors. Social actors are deemed to be either irrelevant can be excluded by the 20 author, just as those that are deemed relevant and serve the interests of the writer and/or those of their readers can be included. This requires setting up which role the social actors will take 21 in the piece of writing. As van Leeuwen states, those roles do not have to be explicitly stated, as
19 Theo van Leeuwen, “ The Representation of Social Actors” in Texts and Practices: Readings in Critical Discourse Analysis, ed. Carmen Rosa Caldas- Coulthard and Malcolm Coulthard (London:
Routledge,1996),32.
20 van Leeuwen, “ Representations of Social Actors”,38. 21 van Leeuwen “ Representations of Social Actors”, 38.
the absence of one social actor would also declare its place. Van Leeuwen does argue that exclusion would be benign, since it may involve details that the writer assumes that the readers already know . However, omissions, whether they are intentional or not do have a large impact 22 on the role of the actors that are excluded. Going back to the idea of otherness, exclusion often point to the root of the idea of the “other”, or being deemed as not worth the writer’s time.
Exclusion of social actors is pertinent to the work being done within this paper. Tony Trew, one of the authors of the seminal work in Critical Linguistics, Language and Power, speaks on the exclusion factor from the point of view of the perpetrator in a quote that van Leeuwen includes. When perpetrators are excluded in order to maintain a narrative, conflict arises around the misrecollections of an event. Perpetrators The following quote is based on Trew’s work on how two South African newspapers, The Times and the Rhodesian Herald, purposely excluded the actions of police open firing on civilian demonstrators during a ‘riot’ . 23
“A suppression of the fact that the white regimes apply violence and intimidation, and suppression of the nature of the exploitation this makes possible. It requires that the regimes and their agents be put constantly in the role of promoters of progress, law and order, concerned to eliminate social evil and conflict, but never responsible for it . ” 24
(Van Leeuwen quoting Trew, 1979: 106) Let us pay closer attention to the phrase “promoters of progress” from the above statement. We can assume from the time period and location, the late 1970’s in South Africa, the political institution of Apartheid was reaching its zenith of racial tension. The exclusion of the police was done in order to keep the role of Police officers and the government as positive in the narrative of Apartheid. It is clear through analysis that authors take into account that the audience of the newspaper would be partial to whatever the newspaper had written, giving them an advantage in appointment of social actors. However, in such a tense political climate, selecting the roles of social actors can be presupposed by the newspaper, but ultimately can be decided by the readers. It is the interpretation of actions and the historical specificity of the event that can sway the public view of social actors.
2.2.1 Social Actors in the United States
22 van Leeuwen“ Representations of Social Actors”,38. 23 van Leeuwen “ Representations of Social Actors”,38. 24 van Leeuwen“ Representations of Social Actors”,39.
Bringing these ideas into the present day in the United States, I would argue, social actors are being played in order to further political agendas. People can display their “less attractive characteristics” when society rapidly changes around them . In response to feeling 25 helpless and threatened. Today in the U.S., this behavior can be found to be especially present in racist rhetoric against people of color or immigrants.The example of Immigration policy and the surrounding public opinions van Leeuwen uses demonstrates the importance of adjectives when placing Social actors into their roles within a discourse. A keyword that is used in the public sentiment is ‘legitimate’ and the perceived fact that conservative people are not able to voice their “legitimate fears”. Van Leeuwen, however, claims that there is no way to know who says that fears are indeed legitimate: fears are not facts . In the years since van Leeuwen’s 26 essay, was written in 1996, there have been many digital advancements that help us to realize that we can in fact decipher who is legitimizing these fears. There is now more information about any possible bias on new outlets, not just print. In the days of the newspaper, the representation of social actors was done in a rather black and white way on the page, and by the very word “ legitimate” being present, the reader can discern that the newspaper as a whole is giving those fears agency. Nowadays, the agency of fear comes from all angles of media, and can legitimize bias and fear through what appears to be more concrete selection of social
actors.
While exclusion is the most effective method to obscure the deeds of social actors in order to maintain a dominant narrative, suppression of social actors is another way to achieve the same effect of the narrative. Van Leeuwen describes suppression as the complete lack of social actors in a text. He also mentions backgrounding: is the lack of mentioning social actors in relation to a specific event, but they are mentioned later on in the text without direct
connection to the event. Backgrounding and suppressing both de-emphasize the social actor, but deciding which tactic to use is dependent on the author. The effect is still the same. The social actor who progresses the narrative stays in a more favorable light. This could be through more detail, or omitting their indiscretions.The way it is omitted in a given text is an indicator of how the author is allocating roles to the social actors. This is used to voice an opinion without knowing who is behind it, giving the possible illusion of neutrality. This can be done in the United States when talking about immigration or race relations. Depending on how conservative or
25 van Leeuwen,“ Representations of Social Actors”,36.
liberal the author may be. It is not to say that the suppression of social actors in the immigration and racial discourse in the United States is dependent on political parties. However, it does play a part in which way the suppression goes in order to frame the discourse.
For the purposes in this paper, I would like to focus on the suppression and
backgrounding of people of color as social actors from a white conservative perspective. While it is not to say that politicians themselves are suppressing social actors, here are many other groups that do suppress and background on, what they feel to be, the politicians behalf. These outlets include the Neo-Confederate groups that we will elaborate on later in this paper.
Returning to the ideas above about the White Southern narrative, it will be argued, that the narrative suppresses people of color as social actors by leaving them ostracized from the main narrative. Van Leeuwen states it is difficult to know if the suppressed social actors are meant to be recognized by the reader or even the writer themselves or not . This is to say that in 27
textbooks, if the author writes a passage, they could or could not have the ability to point to the active suppression of African-Americans as social actors in , for example, the Reconstruction era. The question is if this is a side effect of a deeply rooted racial discourse or the increasing prominence of an outspoken Confederate heritage movement in the American South.
2.3 Heritage Theoretical Framework
As this paper will be written through a heritage lense, it is important to lay out the concepts found in heritage theory that I will be using. The concepts of Cultural Amnesia and Cultural Aphasia are the main theories that will explain not only the root of the doctored pasts that appear in the textbooks, but also its societal effects. Amnesia and Aphasia are taken from their original use in neurological study and placed into the framework of a society and culture. Amnesia can be simply defined as the partial or total loss of memory. Aphasia is the inability to comprehend or produce language. Both theories are born from trauma to the brain. In a rather simple way, social memory serves as the brain of a community and a traumatic event is the source. In this case, the Civil War serves as that source of trauma.
2.3.1 Cultural Amnesia
When it comes to the Civil War, the Confederate states considered the war an attack on their rights as individual states. This fact is evident in many textbooks that have been reviewed by educational professionals. This would be the traumatic event that would trigger PTSD and in turn create the cultural amnesia in the south. Because of the direct threat to states rights, Some 27 van Leeuwen, “ Representations of Social Actors”,41.
states such as Texas have chosen to remember the war in a different way; a way that
legitimizes the subsequent racist behavior of the Post-Civil War era into the modern day. Is the right to own slaves part of Texas’s heritage? It may not have been a strong characteristic of Texas, but since the right to choose tho own slaves was taken away, it became part of their new identity. A traumatic blow to the memory of Texas and other former Confederate states.
Janice Haakon, the author of “Cultural Amnesia: Memory, Trauma, and War” frames her argument around the 9/11/2001 attacks in the United States. She begins by telling an anecdote about a legend that a Guinean woman told her. Telling her that it is not good to send children to America as they bury Africans in shallow graves. This metaphor then sparked the idea of American amnesia when it comes to slavery and colonial exploitation. She introduces the notion that after traumatic events, a society develops a form of societal PTSD. She uses the example of 9/11 and how the disruption of normal daily life and perpetuates the focus on that single traumatic event. The Civil War marked the end of the normal order of things in Southern slave holding states and thus the PTSD set in in response to the social change that the post war period would bring.
2.3.2 Cultural Aphasia
Ann Laura Stoler wrote a paper entitled “Colonial Aphasia: Race and Disabled Histories in France”. This paper is how I came by the application of aphasia as a heritage theory and its use in elaborating on difficult histories. Stoler used the term aphasia rather than amnesia to outline her paper because the term better represented the loss and active disassociation of the French from their colonial history. Aphasia in the colonial discourse means that there is a 28 difficulty speaking about one’s colonial past, but also there is a difficulty finding the right vocabulary to do so. The same theory can be applied to the cultural discourse after the Civil War that was developed in the American South. It is not that there is a complete absence of knowledge, but an inability to form an accurate discourse surrounding the Civil War.
Exactly like the cause of the South’s cultural amnesia, the Civil War and Reconstruction act as the events of trauma that result in cultural aphasia. The damage that was done to the White Southerners memory and the ability to articulate the accuracies of the time is slightly different from the colonial aphasia that France is experiencing as a result of their colonial past. Colonial rhetoric has led to a race discourse caused by political groups in France such as the
28 Ann Laura Stoler, “Colonial Aphasia: Race and Disabled Histories in France” Public Culture 23,
ring wing party, Front National, who spoke about an insecurity in France’s society caused by ‘foreigners’. This sense of insecurity can also be found in the far-right and neo-confederate 29 circles in the United States surrounding immigrants and people of color. These groups have found their sense of security in white supremacy and this security comes at the cost of being unable to articulate the accurate causes of this insecurity.
The Civil War and Reconstruction disrupted the normal way of life for all Southerners, but the effect on White Southerners, they felt, was that of blunt force trauma. This trauma only allowed for white southerners to circumvent the events and their responsibility in the creation of this event. This idea of circumvention rather than confronting responsibility comes from the French sociologist, Georges Balandier. Ann Laura Stoler draws on Balandier’s advocacy for historical sensibility. Balandier was referring to the effects of the French Colonial empire and 30 how the dynamic between the colonizers and the colonized shaped race relations in African societies.
Scholar Caiqiao Huo states in their article “ A Brief Analysis of Culture Aphasia in Higher English Teaching in China” that new words and expressions are restrictive in the development of a culture. This was in reference to the culture aphasia that occurs when a society places 31 much emphasis on learning a new language and culture and an aphasia in relaying their native culture. In this case it was chinese scholars that experienced this in high-level English
Language academics. The emphasis on western cultures and english language they encountered allowed the scholars to embrace what they are learning in order to forge
cross-cultural binds, but along the way lost the ability to articulate their own culture. This loss of cultural articulation comes from the importance placed on the input of of the target language and its culture, neglecting the output of native language so it will form a “one-sided” culture
communication. Huo focuses on a learned language, but I believe that this can also be applied 32 to the Confederate heritage discourse. The change in emphasis went from the White
Southerners being able to use their racial discourse freely, as the established spoken narrative, however the where this differs from Huo’s hypothesis is that the aphasia does not affect the Confederate culture, but the true origins of trauma.
3.0 Historical Context for Case Study
29 Stoler, “ Colonial Aphasia”, 131. 30 Stoler, “ Colonial Aphasia”,133.
31 Cai Qiao Huo, “ A Brief Analysis of Culture Aphasia in Higher English Teaching in China” Sociology Study 5, no. 4 (April 2015): 255.
The following sections will focus on the events and ideologies that helped form the Confederate discourse in the American South. The process of Reconstruction and legal decisions were imperative in the structure of an identity of white southerners that revolved around the superiority of whites over newly emancipated blacks. As the following sections will explain, this mentality was created to keep a semblance of the security for white southerners during these periods of severe social overhaul which would strip them of their privilege.
3.1 Reconstruction and the Formation of Confederate Heritage
After the destruction of the Civil War, an era known as Reconstruction began. Characterized by some as the “darkest page in the saga of American history”, this time period was one of extreme change in the American South and can be considered the birth of modern racism. According to Eric Foner, the utmost historian on Reconstruction, the most significant33 and radical change was the newfound participation by the Black community in Southern public life. This new wave of participation began to highlight white insecurities. The transformation34 from a voiceless body of enslaved people to active architects in the post war period did wonders for the African American narrative of reconstruction. However the white narrative and social memory of this time became skewed. Increasingly diverse communities that had been predominantly white before now had , in their eyes, uninvited narratives and memories that were far removed from their preconceived narratives.
Reconstruction has been mystified by Southern governments as a failure precisely because of these reforms of aspects of life. They gave the new Republican party more leverage in politics. The newly established Republican party of Abraham Lincoln was very different from35 the current Republican party. The 19th century Republicans had beliefs that aligned with the Democratic party today, equality for all men after the restoration of the Union in 1865. It was radical Republicans who created a political environment that Southerners truly opposed and led them to the perception that Reconstruction was a threat to their heritage. Politics played the central part in the success of Reconstruction for the Republicans, but the White Southern Democrats saw their platforms and beliefs being squandered by the policies and efforts that were driving voters into Republican arms. Thaddeus Stevens, a Congressman from
33 Eric Foner, A Short History of Reconstruction: Updated Edition (New York: Harper Perennial Modern
Classic, 2015), xii.
34 Foner, A Short History of Reconstruction, xv.
Pennsylvania led the Radical Republicans and saw the end of the Civil war as a “golden moment” for long-lasting change for the United States. 36
Known for his blunt speaking and the utmost belief that equality comes before the law, Thaddeus Stevens was seen as the politician for both abolitionists and blacks themselves, therefore making him the political adversary for Southern politicians. As the Leader of the 37 Radical Republicans Stevens was the face of change in Southern politicians eyes and any policy or new idea that was proposed by a member of the radicals was placed on his shoulders. Morality rather than economic reform fueled the Radicals, and this was worrying to those in the South or had financial ties to the South. Those with financial ties to the South were worried 38 about radical policies that would upset the labor market. The labor market changed drastically, taking the advantage of the white man from them as both authority figures over the enslaved population, and the majority in the labor force itself. Foner writes:
“ With their personal authority over blacks destroyed, planters turned to the state to re-establish labor discipline. Laws regarding education all formed part of a broad effort to employ state
power to shape the new social relations that would succeed slavery.” 39 This is where the state of Texas and other former Confederate states began to use their
legislative power to dominate the black community and use education as a direct tactic to strong arm the narrative and social memory of the Reconstruction era to their favor. In terms of the Reconstruction era and education, Foner gives us insight to how states other than Texas utilizes education as a form of racial suppression. North Carolina’s public education’s fate hung in the balance of the political move to isolate the black community. This was thanks to President Andrew Johnson’s take on reconstruction. Known as Presidential Reconstruction, Johnson’s plan for reconstructing the American South and their bodies of government did not factor in the Black voice. This had its fans within the states in which the plan was to be enacted. In North 40 Carolina, leaders of the Reconstruction efforts went to astounding lengths in order to avoid the recognition of Blacks as part of their constituency. The governor at the time, Jonathan Worth, 41 had advocated for abolishing the state public education system. The would take away the opportunity for black children to go to public schools. The radical leap in keeping African
36 Foner, A Short History of Reconstruction,105. 37 Foner, A Short History of Reconstruction,105. 38 Foner, A Short History of Reconstruction,106. 39 Foner, A Short History of Reconstruction, 93.
40Eric Foner, “ If Lincoln Hadn’t Died…” American Heritage 58, no.6( Winter 2009). http://www.americanheritage.com/content/if-lincoln-hadn%E2%80%99t-died
Americans out of the public sphere as much as possible would come at the price of white children. The solution for this was for Worth and his legislature to call for local private
academies around the state. This would decimate the Public school system and the chance for Black children to receive an education. A lack of accessible education leaves an individual branded in the labor market as a source of cheap manual labor. The opportunities that an
education provides allows for a sense of self-worth and aspirations. During Slavery, it was illegal for enslaved people to learn how to read and write, so access to education was a symbol of true freedom. This example of a political platform to keep black people out of schools was a new labor initiative that was slavery in all but name.
What Reconstruction truly did for the South was create a culture around racism. The institution of Slavery only created an identity for the white population in the south as African- Americans were not considered part of the Southern population. It had always been just a fact to the wealthy Plantation owners and all white men that they were superior to slaves for the simple reason that they were free. Reconstruction then took down the barriers between enslaved and free, but could not undo the ideology of white southerners that they were simply better. Blacks believed that Reconstruction would be their way out of the stigma of enslavement but it meant placing their trust in the people who had enslaved them and fought an entire war to keep them as property. In many cases, the Reconstruction efforts under Johnson were not aimed to help the freed men and women. Johnson seems to have had an indifference to Black Suffrage, given it was not a main point in his Reconstruction plan, and with his nonchalant attitude towards fighting for the rights of blacks, he drove many Republicans further left on the moral bedrock of what they wanted Reconstruction to achieve. The move of some 42
Republicans to radicalism challenged the narrative that Southern states wanted to actualize on a grand scale. By opposing the sense of morality that was widespread in Northern States, or non-slaveholding states, former confederate states were inventing a regional heritage based on the foundation of perceived racial oppression against whites. This narrative rested purely on the fabrication of a racial enemy of former enslaved men coming into society with a vendetta
against former slave owners.
A major blow to the identity of the South was the Radical Republicans proposal to confiscate plantations and to redistribute the land to the former enslaved population. This was to be an effort to reform Southern society and to give former slaves leverage in the formation of their communities. Stevens and some Radical Republicans had proposed the seizure of 400 42 Foner, A Short History of Reconstruction,108.
million acres of land from the wealthiest plantation owners. Foner writes that some 43
Republicans did not see granting land to blacks as important as black suffrage, but in the minds of former slaves owning and working their own land would be just as much an opportunity to have a voice as voting. Being a landowner would have given former slaves a sense of security, but that would come at the cost of the South’s ruling class of Plantation owners. Since many of these wealthy planters had had their plantations in their families for generations, this would have been seen as an attack on their personal family history and a major part of Southern heritage. 3.2 Legal Foundations of the Confederate Narrative
The legal scholar Alfred Brophy delves into the legal aspects of Confederate Heritage in his article “ Confederate memory and monuments: Of Judicial Opinions, Statutes, and
Buildings”. The placement of monuments, strategically, in front of courthouses is a deliberate move to stake claim to the dominant narrative of the Civil War in the South and also to serve as a symbolic reminder that the law remains on the white Confederate’s side. Brophy begins by explaining that there was a form of reconciliation of Americans after the Civil war, but
consequently they were left to their own devices as the dust settled into the reconstruction period . This reconciliation was in part thanks to selective memory, a concept in heritage 44 studies that stipulates that societies choose what to remember. Selective memory will play a large part in this paper as the process of creating a dominant narrative is a very deliberate act. The dominant narrative of any society is easy to justify from a legal perspective. This is when analysis of judicial opinions and precedents come into play.
“In a field like law, which draws so much upon cultural values, it is no surprise that judges-likes historians, novelists, and filmmakers- reflected an incorrect view of history and build upon it. ” This quote helps us to understand that personal bias around historical events can45 even affect the most presumably neutral field,Law. This incorrect version of history has become law and therefore perceived as truth. Supreme Court rulings have played on common misconceptions and inaccurate themes based on race in order to portray their judicial opinions 46 . Brophy states that precedents set by cases such as Plessy v. Ferguson are excellent examples of how the common thought of the day influenced the decisions, and in this case, it was the idea of segregation that was being upheld by the highest court in the land. This 1896
43 Foner, A Short History of Reconstruction,107.
44 Alfred Brophy, “ Confederate Memory and Monuments: Of Judicial Opinions, Statutes and Buildings” Journal of International Affairs 60, no.1 (Fall/Winter 2006):125.
45 Brophy, “ Confederate Memory and Monuments”, 127. 46 Brophy “ Confederate Memory and Monuments”, 127.
decision was upheld until the landmark decision of Brown v Board of Education in 1954 concluded that the “ separate but equal” judgment was in fact unconstitutional. 47 With segregation and white superiority being part of the South’s post Civil War identity, it is no surprise taking away a part of Southern white culture would upset the narrative they have created. Harking back to a time when life was easier is a natural act of memory. Due to the selective memory of southern communities, this change in law marks a time when white Southerners lives were directly affected for the worse. They were now not given de facto priority by de jure segregation. Legislative actions have substantiated societal beliefs and educators, as the above quote shows,are also susceptible to interpreting societal and communal norms with bias.
The need to create their own narrative and bring that narrative into the public school system in former Confederate states is only substantiated by judicial decisions like Plessy v. Ferguson and the overturning decision of Brown v Board. Education can be argued to be a main channel through which to protect and preserve heritage and with the major technicality of state organized educational systems the narrative that is being told can be, as we will continue to uncover, misremembered and inaccurate. Going back to Brophy’s point about post civil war reconciliation, the process in which reconciliation takes place relies very much on how the past is spoken about . Regarding legal discourse, the major decisions made by the supreme court48 rely on the language of the time, but they have implanted verbiage that is still used today in certain circles. With so much emphasis being placed on the law, it is a natural conclusion that rights and narratives that were once protected under the law now seem more precious to protect.
This protection comes in the form of education. With important precedents being overturned, those with the power to establish the dominant narrative feel as though they have lost their agency, which is in fact not the case. The ways of the “ Old South” are hard to justify in the current political climate, however the surefire way to keep the ideals of the confederate heritage is to implement them into the curriculum of school districts.
3.3 Neo-Confederate Influence
This paper does not aim to show the direct influence of Neo-Confederate groups on textbooks and education in Texas. It simply aims to conduct an analysis of misrecollections
47 “ Plessy v. Ferguson” accessed January 16, 2019,
https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/163/537.
within a textbook that could goad misinformed rhetoric that Neo-Confederate groups hold as truth.
While I would like to argue that racial superiority is one of the main ideals of the Confederacy that lingers and poses several civil rights violations; but is it not its main identifier. The notions of a history misremembered is the signal identifier that spurs the Neo-confederate take on Southern history. According to the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), Neo-Confederate is defined as having a predilection for the symbols of the Neo-Confederate States of America and strongly believing in the validity of nullification and secession .The SPLC clarifies 49 that the term Neo-Confederate is an umbrella term and should be viewed as a spectrum, and the extremism of the various Neo-Confederate groups falling into that spectrum. In a graphic on their website, the SPLC shows the rise and fall of Neo Confederate groups from the year 1999 to 2017. With a major spike of 124 groups in 2001, presumably after the events of 9/11, groups have been on the decline since 2008, going from 93 to 68 in just a span of a year and declining still, to 31 in 2017. However this does not symbolize a decline in activity, but suggests a more unified front with greater organization. Going from small town groups to larger groups with growing political and social influence in southern communities, the Neo-Confederate narrative holds great power in communities that sympathize and identify with Neo-Confederate ideals.
Neo-Confederate groups are classified as hate groups and have taken to expressing their quest to control their own identities through avenues of hate, although distancing themselves from the specific guise of white supremacy similar to that of the Ku Klux Klan, while keeping the sentiment . A prominent Neo-Confederate group, League of the South expresses 50 that its members believe in an “Anglo Celtic” leadership and a christian theocratic regime that would suppress people of color minorities through politics . What is truly interesting for this 51 paper is the geographical pride of the South portrayed by the League of the South itself. In the SPLC’s extensive report on the hate group, they mention that the League openly denounces the Federal Government, referencing it and the Northern and Coastal states as an anti-religious “Empire” . They are solidifying the geographic pride of the South by alienating the former52 Union, almost demonizing the North, just as the Confederate States of America has done. This is again in order to justify their actions against a threat on their heritage. They are creating a
49 “Neo-Confederate.”, Hate Groups, Accessed November, 2018,
https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/ideology/neo-confederate.
50“ Neo-Confederate.” 51 “Neo-Confederate.” 52 “ Neo-Confederate.”
wider base of “ otherness” to hold their heritage closer to what they want to have the freedom to express.
4.0 The Case Study: The TEKS United States History to 1877 textbook by McGraw- Hill Publishing
This textbook was chosen from the long list of textbooks that were investigated by the Washington Post. Upon finding this textbook and the passage the Post found problematic, I wanted to find a more recent version of this textbook. In order to look critically at the direct implications of the Texas Board of Education vote to remove historical figures. This led me to this specific textbook designed for Grade 8. The following analysis will investigate the knowledge that is exhibited in this textbook and the narrative that it is perpetuating.
When I first chose this textbook, I was curious as to what the “TEKS” stood for. I soon discovered that it stands for Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills. Upon further research, I found that TEKS is the standard that students need to adhere to. It is a specified common core curricular success tool that is directly related to the Texas Department of Education. According to the Texas Education Agency website, the Texas State Board of Education has legislative authority over TEKS and the subjects to which it applies. The website also states that the State Board of Education nominates reviewers of53 the educational material, which leads us back to the question of what role textbooks play in perpetuating cultural amnesia and aphasia that solidifies the narrative that the Texas government wants to portray. Going back to the initial case that sparked this entire research
53 “ Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills”, Curriculum Standards, Accessed November 2018,
project, the vote to remove Hillary Clinton and Helen Keller from the curriculum, this case is making more of an argument that Textbooks are becoming more beholden to political bias.
This textbook is specifically made to uphold the standards that the Texas legislature has constructed and therefore is an example worth investigating for a discourse that is creating a problematic educational foundation for texan schools. A very telling sign of where conservative lawmakers want to take education can be found in the 2018 Texas Republican Platform, which states that it wants to see the Department of education abolished as they do not see education as a necessary ward of the federal government. It is point 119 on their agenda. This proposed 54 abolition of the Federal Department of Education would leave the path to inaccurate narratives unbarred. As this is an active change that the conservatives in Texas want to make, it is no wonder that there has been motive to hold on to misremeberings in textbooks. They would still be the individuals charged with the official Texan narrative when education becomes non-federalized.
At the beginning of lessons in the book, the TEKS standards are ever-present in the margins. As an example of the structured learning curve of TEKS; the requirements for one of the chapters we will investigate are as follows (Chapter 18, Lesson 1):
“1A:Identify the major eras and events in U.S. history through 1877, including colonization, revolution, drafting of the Declaration of Independence, creation and ratification of the Constitution, religious revivals such as the Second Great Awakening, early republic, the Age
of Jackson, westward expansion, reform movements, sectionalism,Civil War, and Reconstruction, and describe their causes and effects.
1C: Explain the significance of the following dates: 1607, founding of Jamestown; 1620 arrival of the Pilgrims and signing of the Mayflower Compact; 1776, adoption of the Declaration
of Independence; 1787, writing of the U.S. Constitution; 1803, Louisiana Purchase; and 1861-1865, Civil War.
8A: Explain the roles played by significant individuals during the Civil War, including Jefferson Davis, Ulysses S. Grant, Robert E. Lee, and Abraham Lincoln, and heroes such as
congressional Medal of Honor recipients William Carey and Philip Bazaar.
54 “ GOP Platform”, Accessed November 2018,
8B: Explain the causes of the Civil War, including sectionalism, state’s rights, and slavery, and significant events of the Civil War, including the firing on Fort Sumter;the Battles of
Antietam,Gettysburg,and Vicksburg; the announcement of the Emancipation Proclamation; Lee’s surrender at Appomattox Court House; and the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.
10A: Locate places and regions of importance in the United States during the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries.”
P. 502
These are just a few examples of the dozens of TEKS concepts that students are required to know. The full list of required TEKS can be found in the designated section ranging from pages 1 to 15 in the introductory section of the textbook. Covering topics such as
Government, Citizenship, and economics, the concepts serve as a roadmap to creating a student body who can reiterate and explain topics according to how the governing educational bodies dictate. While the list seems benign, it is the bias discourse within the textbook that warrants investigation.
Along with these state mandated “essential knowledge and skills” being present in the margins of the textbook, The material reviews at the end of each chapter are designed to have the student answer in the manner to corresponds with a particular requirement. This
assessment style with specific reference to TEKS objective. All of the TEKS are in a specific chapter in the beginning of the book. This form of assessment makes it so that the student themselves are tested by state standards, according to the narrative that the Department of Education and the Texas Education Agency have established. These lesson assessments are not a assessment of the student’s knowledge, but rather a structured environment for students to regurgitate information as it pleases these state education agencies.
The passages that follow are taken from the 2014 and 2016 editions of the textbook.
4.1 Case Study Passage #1
The Teks United States History to 1877 textbook has been modified since it’s 2014 version that was investigated by the Washington Post. The problematic text that was found in the 2014 edition was as stated:
“ Southerners used states’ rights to justify secession. Each state, they argued, had voluntarily chosen to enter the Union. They defined the Constitution as a contract among the independent states. They believed the national government had broken the contract by refusing
to enact the Fugitive Slave Act and denying Southern states equal rights in the territories. As a result, Southerners argued, the states had the right to leave the Union.”
The Washington Post points to this passage, and other textbooks which had similar passages, as part of the misleading teachings of the reasons of the Civil War. The passage above places the Union in a position of deceit and deception as the Northern states do not give the southern states that wish to secede the right to do so. In the words above, they are falling back on the contract that is the Constitution itself. This wording of deceit gives the
neo-confederate argument more sway as if the Confederate States were promised that they would maintain autonomy in matters such as slavery and that they may come and go from the Union as they pleased. The sentence stating “ They believed the national government had broken the contract by refusing to enact the Fugitive Slave Act …” holds significant sway in the Confederate and Neo- Confederate argument for remembering the causes of the Civil War as state’s rights rather than slavery. The Fugitive Slave Act, enacted in 1850, required the return of a runaway enslaved person to their owner, despite the event of them making into a non-slave holding state. This was also at the risk of a fine to anyone who failed to turn in any found runaway . Historically, the Northern states did want to enforce this as they believed they were 55 enforcing and supporting slavery, despite making it illegal in their state. This law was biased towards Southern Slaveholders. By painting a memory of this law and its benefits as being denied to those powerful Southern Slaveholders, this textbook is in fact substantiating claims of Union treachery.
Using van Leeuwen’s framework of social actors, the language surrounding the South creates the image of the betrayed social actor. Words such as “ voluntarily” and “contract” give the South the benefit of being described as a willing signer of the Constitution. This places them in the role of the main social actor whose narrative is deemed to be correct. By being the victim of a “broken” contract by the North “refusing” to enact the Fugitive Slave Act, the South is arranged in a manner that their rights are being abused by the North. The phrase “ denying
55“Fugitive Slave Acts”, HISTORY, Last Edited September 12,2018,
equal rights” solidifies the image of the overbearing North abusing the rights of the South in the supposedly non-binding contract that is the Constitution.
4.2 Case Study Passage #2
Chapter 18 is about the Civil War from 1861-1865. The chapter itself is comprised of 5 lessons, from an explanation of the two sides through to the end of the war. Through this first lesson beginning on page 502, “ The Two Sides”, the Confederate side takes precedence over the Union side. The passages I would like to look at are focused on the “ Strengths and
Weaknesses” and “ Goals of War”. The Passages are as follows: “Strengths and Weaknesses
When the war began, each side had advantages and disadvantages compared to the other. How each side used its strengths and weaknesses would determine the war’s outcome. The North had a larger population and more resources than the South. The South had other advantages, such as excellent military leaders and a strong fighting spirit. Also, because most of
the war was fought in the , The South knew the land and had the will to defend it. The Goals of War
Each side had different goals in fighting the Civil War. The Confederacy wanted to be an independent nation. To do this, it did not have to invade the North or destroy the Union army. It just needed to fight hard enough and long enough to convince the Northerners that the war was
not worth its cost. In contrast, the North wanted to restore the Union. In President Lincoln’s view, states had no constitutional right to secede from the Union. Its forces had to invade the South and force the breakaway states to give up their quest for independence. Although slavery
was an underlying cause of the war, Lincoln’s original claim was not to end slavery... ” p. 503
Where I would like to begin with this passage is the phrasing that allows the Southern position to overtake the Northern position. According to van Leeuwen’s role of social actors, which social actor takes precedence in the text is indicative of the authors’ positionality. The ratio between the South’s story and the North’s story being told is unequal, which is an indicator of an unfair narrative. The Confederacy is written about more and this puts the reader in a position to identify the first narrative as an underdog and see the second as an antagonizer in this conflict.
The confederacy as the positive social actor lends this textbook to being subject to cultural amnesia by means of forgetting the true cause behind the war. The phrase “ fighting
spirit” in the passage above places the people of the South at a moral advantage that it
otherwise does not have from a historical standpoint. By accentuating their spirit, the author has placed the South on the “ right” side. By emphasizing the “ fighting spirit” of the Confederacy as well as featuring the excellence of their military leaders, this gives a broader image of the South as an underdog when compared to the advantages of the North. The Union’s population and resources are aspects that they do not have a choice over. They simply have more people and more resources; there is no mention of their collective will as a strength. The comparison of the strengths and weaknesses of the North and South give more agency to the South as their strengths are aspects in which they have a choice. By doing this, the author has not placed the North on the “wrong” side, but has simply chosen to use motivating language to describe the Confederate situation which highlights their narrative. By not going into detail of the North’s advantages, the textbook is placing the Confederate story above that of the North and essentially telling the student that it is not important or correct. This of course is going to be based off the authors point of view.
It is also an excellent example of the exclusion of social actors by van Leeuwen. As I have said above in a previous section, the exclusion of social actors is an active “ otherization” of actors and their narratives. Mainstream examples of creating the “other” are the foundations of distancing oneself and their group from the “other” group in order to deemphasize their narrative and place the main narrative into the limelight. We can automatically assume that exclusion means the writing off of the narrative that goes against the dominant story, but van Leeuwen also makes a distinction between the exclusion of the opposite social actor all together and the exclusion of actions by the dominant social actor to further their progress as the ones in charge. The latter is more destructive to a fair narrative as it omits aspects that could sway a third parties’ opinion, or in this case, a student body’s opinion.
The phrase “ promoters of progress”(see section 2.2) comes to mind again with this passage. The moral high ground that is alluded to with the language of the first paragraph gives the Confederacy the benefit of their cause within this textbook to be the route of progress. Progress in this textbook is shown by the explicit mention will for an independent nation by the Confederates. In the second passage above, the Southern narrative is once again the focal point of the passage and therefore should be the focal point of the lesson. This paragraph focuses on the goals of each side but as we can clearly see, does not give each side equal footing. The Confederate goals are made out to be very simple and almost non combative. By stating that the confederates did not need to win the war, they just had to show the North that
war was not worth it, the author is putting the advantage with the Confederates in terms of wanting to keep the peace. Yet again this alludes to morality.
The language that is used to describe the Southern or Confederate perspective in this textbook indicates a discourse that favors the plight of the Confederates and sees the Union, which is the current government today as invaders and plunderers of heritage. This is
contrasted in this passage by the rather bullish language that is used to describe the Northern reaction to the southern quest of succession. As Critical discourse analysis suggests, the language is indicative of a pattern within this education community with farther reach to the greater society outside the classroom. Revisiting the ideas of Burr and Gergen on historical and cultural specificity, this interaction that is being created between the North and the South is tenuous. By using words such as “forces” and “ invade”, it puts the North in a position of unlawfulness. This compliments the narrative that is being told about the causes of the war, especially the first passage of the case study. The 2014 edition of this textbook made it clear that the Confederate States felt that the Constitution was a contract that was broken by the Union by not allowing the Fugitive Slave Act. By feeling that the Union had made unjust decisions that impacted the Southern states, the language of this textbook reflects the total unjust nature that the Confederacy placed on the Union.
This articulation of unjustified actions by the Union within this passage gives justification to the Confederate narrative that is being used today to protect Confederate heritage. The forceful language of invasion juxtaposed with the language of liberation is congruent with the self-impression of Confederates that they were victim to the Union’s enforcement of an unjust contract. An example of Union enforcement is the sentence “In President Lincoln’s view, states had no constitutional right to secede from the Union”. This sentence brings us back to the first passage and the emphasis on the importance of rights to the Confederate narrative. In this sentence, it is President Lincoln who is the personification of the Union and the one who is depicted challenging the South’s right to secede. The importance of state’s rights to the Confederate narrative is being challenged in this passage by one of the most important figure from the Civil War, which once again stacks the odds against the South in this narrative. The sentence further advances the “underdog” identity of the Confederacy by pitting them against the figure of Abraham Lincoln and the Union.
We can revisit the issue of confederate monuments to compliment this notion of
victimhood. Monuments themselves are political. In the article, “ The Lost Cause and Reunion in the Confederate Cemeteries of the North” by Ned Crankshaw, Joseph E. Brent and Maria
Campbell Brent, monuments are argued to be born from the same campaigns that develop political positions, educational efforts and organized rituals whose goal is to normalize ideas and behavior. What adds to this idea of normalized ideas is the personal connection of many white 56 southerners to Confederate soldiers. Once again, now in contemporary times, the justification of their heritage is coming under fire, and yet again the white southern community is feeling victim to an overwhelming opposition to their “cause”. This comes from language that is ingrained in the common discourse in a community and has normalized the self-recognized plight of the Confederate legacy. As we can see from the passage above, this discourse of Confederate passivity against Union vehemence augments the identity of a cultural underdog whose heritage is continuously under attack. This target of course is self made and is perpetuated by tools such as this textbook. As the passage says itself, “ It [the Confederacy] just needed to fight hard enough and long enough to convince Northerners that the war was not worth its cost.” This 57 sentence holds substantial symbolism for the Confederate and Neo- Confederate narrative today; if they can keep fighting for this narrative through means of education and general discourse, those who oppose their ideals will be shown it is not worth the fight.
The last point of this passage I would like to focus on is the last sentence. It reads, “Although slavery was an underlying cause of the war, Lincoln’s original aim was not to end slavery.” This sentence’s aim is to deemphasize the role that slavery played as a pinnacle role in the start of the war. If it is painted as not the main cause of the war, especially through the eyes of the North, the issue altogether will take a backseat role to state’s rights. Since the recognition of state’s rights as one of the causes of the war is a designated skill that the TEKS curriculum requires students to master, this rather nonchalant introduction to slavery as a cause invites many questions as to the severity of the slavery issue within the discourse portrayed by this textbook. I find it interesting that the authors chose to introduce slavery in this manner and having it be accompanied by this quote by President Lincoln in 1862:
“ If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some slaves and leaving
others alone I would also do that.”
P. 504
56 Ned Crankshaw, Joseph E. Brent and Maria Campbell Brent, “The Lost Cause and Reunion the
Confederate Cemeteries of the North” Landscape Journal 35, no.1 (2016):1
57 Joyce Appleby et al.,TEKS United States History to 1877, (New York: McGraw-Hill Education,
