What the hell is this book going on about? This is a school-issued book and it seems incredibly biased. One part even said that Europeans took ideas from more "advanced societies", what does this even mean?
Am I overreacting or do you guys have some other stories and examples of obvious bias in textbooks?
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They did often take ideas from more advanced societies.
Maybe the book accentuates how much because of an agenda but that statement isn't incorrect.
>One part even said that Europeans took ideas from more "advanced societies",
In what context? If they're talking about neolithic or the bronze or iron ages, or even the early middle ages, there's nothing wrong with that. If it's about the early modern period then yeah, that's biased; Europeans did adopt ideas from abroad but they were hardly more 'advanced'.
Everyone took ideas from more advanced societies except for the progenitors of civilization like the Sumerians, Egyptians, Olmecs, Chinese.
Even they did. Sumerians and Egyptians got agriculture and other neolithic developments from the Levant, Olmecs got agriculture from the Mexican highlands, Chinese got Buddha'd, etc. No society developed completely independently.
They were talking about the colonial age, so when China and India "stagnated" for the most part.
Well there was stuff like rocketry copied from India, porcelain copied from China, etc. But they were hardly more advanced than Europeans in most ways. These kind of world history school books usually aren't very good and try to hard to be politically correct.
Europeans did learn superior rocket technology from Indians. Of course, they made better versions afterward.
So it was a few things that they took because Europe was behind for a while? What about ancient china, around 1 A.D.? The book usually goes into great depths about China and says almost nothing negative about them at all. Were they good boys who dindu nuffin?
they basically wish to write Europeans and European accomplishments out of history, but they have to do it gradually
Not so much that European civilization was "behind" but rather that any two civilizations will diverge and take different paths. Different peoples will always have things they are better at than others. Europeans were surpassingly good at stonework, for example, better than overall more advanced societies in the middle ages.
Most of my history books in schools were overtly Eurocentric so I got the impression they were being biased towards pushing a Eurocentric narrative.
Yeah, mine were the same. We started with Rome and only focused on Europe and America from there. The rest of the world only got attention with modern stuff like India's independence.
>High School kids complaining about their high school homework.
Where did you go to school?
Not in high school. I picked it up at a yard sale and have been reading it over the past few weeks.
It's how they rationalize taking over European culture from the inside out.
>Grown ass man is puzzled by high school textbook.
Embarrassing.
Quote the section for us, if you're not just fishing for (you)'s
Not puzzled at the content, just the agenda they seem to be pushing. Why are you upset?
In Californication.
>Even as they held onto this sense of religious superiority, Europeans nonetheless adopted many of the ideas and techniques of more advanced societies.
It's not even the fact that Europe adopted other aspects, it's that they called other societies "advanced".
More context, user. Take a picture of the entire page.
Found this on the 4th page of this PDF, might be the book you're talking about:
therodriguezpost.weebly.com
Seems to me like it's actually saying in previous centuries (i.e. before the 18th century) Europeans considered other societies advanced but religiously inferior, which is true reading reports of travelers to the courts of sultans and emperors in Asia, but that this changed later, like the other anons have said.
You misread the book, and lead us to believe there's some agenda behind your misreading. Are you sure you're not the one with the agenda instead?
My point is that they said more advanced societies. I thought every culture and society was different, but equal. That's what school taught me, after all. Also, if you have read the book, it seemingly glances over certain things and hits on others that makes Europeans look terrible.
Really? Not him, but we got no more than five minutes of rome, two minutes of the middle ages, and three minutes of renaissance. Industrial revolution had a bit more on it, but not by much.
That's what my education was. We talked about Rome for a few days in total, China for probably two weeks in total, middle ages for 3-4 days, and the industrial revolution for a little more than a week.
Yeah, reading that in context it hardly seems bad at all.
Historically, China was pretty insular, so there's not much bad stuff to say about them in regards to expansionism and attacking foreign civilizations up until the Qing. Also, the Tang Dynasty was pretty expansionist, but that's about it
Broad value judgements like "good", "bad", "advanced", and "primitive" are avoided because they convey little information and because they start idiotic conversations like this one. Comparing, say, the metallurgy of two peoples is fine, but saying one is "advanced" it too vague. So you're right, it was poorly worded. You're also right that the author probably wouldn't have used the word advanced in the context of Europeans being more advanced than some other people. I don't think it's charitable to assume that the author was consciously pushing an agenda. If I had to guess I would say the author is just used to trying to not say Europeans or whites are "more something" than other people that he don't even notice when he reversed the role and said someone else is vaguely superior to Europeans. Don't go getting your panties in a knot and joining the /pol/ crusade over one guy's poor wording.
It sounds to me like you're looking for reasons to feel indignant and offended.
Granted your cherrypicked excerpt could have been wordered better (IE "Europeans adopted advanced ideas and techniques from other societies") but you seem to be deliberately inferring connotations where you can maximize how offended you feel. Then you're deliberately sharing those particular shreds out of context to try and rile people up.
They said more advanced societies where it was appropriate to say it, because European writers themselves would say as much when talking of places like Medieval Persia or China.
>Egyptians got agriculture and other neolithic developments from the Levant
Pre Dynastic Egypt's major influences came largely from Nubia, such playes like Nabta Playa helped form some of AE's ideas on astrology and astronomy, that's just one example.