The Power of a Textbook: Deeper Into Social Studies

While working on the Map Assignment, I was super intrigued by the short clip included, where the committee emphasized the need for a new projection of the world map. It was almost shocking to me how easily tricked I was by the Mercator projection, not realizing that it was a distorted map made with imperialistic and eurocentric views. It had looked like something out of a middle school textbook, and that’s probably because it was. I was shocked at how children around the world could so easily be taught false information.

How strange is it that the creators behind our educational sources of history such as textbooks and world maps embody the power to skew which parts of history they want to, and take out what they don’t want to be seen? Why is it that our curriculum doesn’t tell the whole truth? Why teach children that Germany is the same size as the continent of Africa, when in fact, it’s not even close? I find it very interesting. I related this class exercise immediately to my other course where we discussed alternate viewpoints of history. This is just one reason why we see so many Americans lose faith in our education system.

As important as visuals are to American education, visuals can also be misleading. In a world where we depend of photos and images to simplify meaning for us, there is always a chance that these images may be steering us in the wrong direction. Start asking yourself, what is the background behind this photo or shot? What point of view is this taken from?

What are your thoughts?