“Researchers argue that texts are written in such a way that they are divorced from the lives and experiences of student readers, thus rendering them difficult to assimilate and understand by their intended audience.” — (Marino, 2011, p 422)

I hooked into this quote in the Marino (2011) article about history textbooks, because I think the major sin in my field is not that biased history is offensive, but that it is boring beyond belief and does not reflect the true diversity of the people of the United States. This was certainly the impression that I got from reviewing Magruder’s American Government (McClenaghan, 2003), and from reading a few of my classmates reviews of other social studies texts. If we as educators try to remove all bias from our teaching materials, and treat it as if it is not there, we risk giving students the impression that there exists one truthful perspective, and we (or the textbook) are the keepers of it. I would hate for one of my students to become uninterested in politics, because he or she did not feel represented by the textbook’s photos, or because the issues discussed were superficial.

I think it is best to make bias a topic for explicit discussion, so that students learn how to identify it and think critically. Even a highly biased and reactionary article teaches something about a topic, though it should not be considered a faithful representation of facts. For my classroom, I would select a decent basal text for vocabulary and background, then supplement it with articles that reflect diverse perspectives. We could practice evaluating claims and formulating arguments while engaging with more transformative texts from an ethnic or gender perspective. These have their limits as well, but they help form a complete worldview. I would also consider having my students evaluate their textbooks as we did, and identify instances of bias or under-representation. This would hopefully give them a sense of power over what they are learning, and help them engage with key concepts

References

Marino, M. P. (2011). High school world history textbooks: An analysis of content focus and chronological approaches. History Teacher, 44(3), pp 421-446.

McClenaghan, W. A. (ed). (2003). Magruder’s American Government (2003 edition). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall