, father steve, this could be a subject that slips into a war.. but as see your agruement, Surely students of art ought to be able to view those masterpieces which have religious subjects without their teacher being accused of proselytizing. -- i think about the fact that i was never taught that algerba was an arab inventions..
the whole idea of arabic numbers (a term i never learned till out of highschool!) came from the arab world..
now, i went to a RC school, and they did give a history books with a definate religious slant. (ie, we learned about 'good Queen Mary'--ie, "bloody Mary", Queen Elizabeth's older sister.) and the whole of crusades were very slanted to show the views of christianity.. (and after reading more, i tend to agree with that view)
but no where, were we taught about any of the influence of non europeans --a little snuck in in HS level but really history was all viewed through the eyes of europeans...
china gets a mention in the middle ages,(marco polo) and the idea of orient is kicked around, leading to the discovery of the americas, and then china make an appearance again in the boxer war, --japan is treated the same way too, only of interest when europeans went there.
history books, even a HS level cover "world history" as "the history of european exploration of the world"-- its a very simplistic view.
and the treatment of africa is worse! 99.9% of american think all of africa is inhabitated by negros.. they are unaware of berbers (an ethnic group found on the north edge of africa), or that bush men- (crossing thread) are an other total different groups.. and why should they? the only mentions africa rates is in the history of slavery.. (its as if nothing ever happened there till europeans showed up!)
so i am all for immigrant learning about european history, and culture, it is the predomiante one here in US, and i think it has a lot to offer the world, it is more democratic and tolerant than most other cultures in the world..
but we children of european settlers, and inheritors of european culture, need to learn more about the world!
