The Stories We Tell

Decent Essays
To me the significance of this title is the “stories” that we are taught in school is not the full truth of what happened. It has been proven time and time again that in America we tend to “whitewash” history, not telling the full truth and not telling all of the sides. For example, being taught that christopher columbus was the first person to discover America and that him and all the Native Americans got along and everyone lived happily ever after.“The Stories We Tell” are the stories that Americans (aka white people) tell to make our own history look less terrible.
This episode really shows the true sides of the stories. They aren’t all lies but the full truth is not always told. In my opinion this is so whites do not come across as evil

Related Documents

  • Superior Essays

    The documentary We Shall Remain- After the Mayflower presented contact and interactions between settlers and Native Americans in the early periods of English colonization. It used a familiar event; the Mayflower and the establishment of Plymouth as a colonial settlement to bring forth the information in a new way. Right from the beginning of the film, it clearly and quite drastically separated itself from other documentaries of its type. While other documentaries, and many have done so, would have focused its story-telling and angle of telling this history on the colonists, this centered on the Wampanoag people.…

    • 1373 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In Caribbean Literature and the Environment: Between Nature and Culture “Landscapes, Narratives, and Tropical Nature: Creole Modernity in Suriname” by Ineke Phaf-Rheinberger she discusses topics such as: Elisabeth Samson, Wilhelmina Rijurg (Maxi Linder), kankantri, polyphony, and polysemy. The conflict is present in Creole modernity in Suriname and tropical nature, because of the narratives that Cynthia McLeod, Clark Accord, and Astrid Roemer present. Elisabeth Samson is an African American woman, and she was born in 1715. Rheinberger discusses what McLeod said about Samson, “this book is based on the life story of an exceptional black women in the eighteenth century, Elisabeth Samson. Mcleod’s research on Elisabeth Samson reveals that she…

    • 805 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Remember History Repeats: Whitewashing of American history. If students of the United States learned what actually happened in our history, we would be one of two things: terrified or open minded and know about whitewashing. Whitewashing is defined as the cover up of crimes, vice, or scandals to perfunctory investigation. The students deserve to know what really happened years ago. How come we don’t get to learn about the $5 Indians?…

    • 1677 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    When we look at back into history, there are many events that occurred in order to reach the point where were are now in our current society. There are several lessons that teach the perspective of only one side of the story. By looking at historic events from the viewpoint of the victims, we can see a whole new outlook on how our history affected everyone involved. Howard Zinn describes these outlooks perfectly in Columbus, the Indians, and Human Progress. Perhaps some of the “heroes” in history are not actually who they are made out to be.…

    • 619 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Most African Americans are not aware of their history. Rarely, do they recognize or honor figures before their time that helped make a change for the future. Mary McLeod Bethune, a woman from poverty, becomes one of the nation’s African American leaders of her time. Bethune’s life consisted of three different careers: an educator, an essential figure to the creation of Bethune-Cook Man College in Dayton Beach, Florida; along with founder and president of the National Council of Negro Women.…

    • 1340 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Satire In South Park

    • 812 Words
    • 4 Pages

    outh Park’s 12th episode of the seventh season opens up in a classroom where a student who’s black, the only one in class for that matter, is quite noticeable in the array of students. The episode’s central motion revolves on that black student, Token, who is condemned and discriminated by his fellow students for being far richer than any kids in town. He then resulted to trying to fit in but miserably failed so he tried to bring in more rich people in town. He succeeded in doing so and affluent families now continuously invade South Park. This sparked rebellion from the town people who are considered poor.…

    • 812 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Every Life Matters I really only started understanding the meaning of abortion once one of my mom’s friends had one. Before that I had very little knowledge about abortion. My parents have always taught me to stand by what I believe and that others may have different beliefs. They always told me that I would meet people that would disagree with me and what I believe not only when it came to these kind of topics but many other things as well. Being told that, they told me to always respect people’s beliefs and their points of view because everyone has the right to stand by what they believe, just like I do.…

    • 506 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The beauty and desire of an acknowledgeable love without boundaries within a limitless horizon. This is a paradoxical dream within the story of a woman, whos unwavering convictions on love were senseless overshadowed by idiotic customs of a fierceful society full of prejudice and naïveté. A dream that can be more vividly seen by analyzing Their eyes were watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, specifically if we emphasize our perspective in the young life of Janie, a courageous woman who valiantly listened to her sentimental ideals and allowed them to have the last word within her decisions and actions. This paradoxical dream was the only fuel that triggered an adventure full of obstacles, but also full of hope within Janie’s chase for true happiness, a chase that ironically also involuntarily unleashed experiences of profound despair, sadness and…

    • 476 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Stories Came To Earth

    • 235 Words
    • 1 Pages

    “How Stories Came to Earth” consists of not one but two characters working together to solve the conflict of the story, Anansi and Aso. The couple are not just friends as many tales include, but rather married. This means that their bond is not easily broken by physical or mental means, so they work together easily and efficiently. When Anansi finally decides to take on the challenge of capturing feared creature of the land, “He first [asks] his wife, Aso, how he might capture Onini, the python that swallows men whole” (40). As any good team does, they have a system of defeating these obstacles; Aso schemes and creates plans that few could while Anansi carries them out.…

    • 235 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Picking Cotton Summary

    • 1743 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Jennifer explained, "A white woman raped in her home in the middle of the night by a black man who had the audacity to outrun the police and the dogs, and then go on to rape another white woman in her home didn’t sit very well with the…

    • 1743 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    During and after the group project I got a better understanding of NAVAL and a better understanding of my group. For example, Lexi is the leader of the group and Camille is the worker bee meaning that she is the one to go to for the information about the presentation. There were many high points in the group such as when we completed are power point early and when we researched the information. I had a blast working with them. A low point was when the video couldn’t load and we had to start from scratch again.…

    • 467 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In Chimamanda Adichie’s video she discusses the dangers of a single story in terms of people only being exposed to one story or viewpoint, which hinders their assumptions. There were many stereotypes or single stories mentioned such as nigerians failed government and failed infrastructure. Therefore, individuals assuming that the people of Nigeria are all a product of their environment and must be failures as well. She also mentions Africa in the context of writers and story tellers and how even Adichie had limited herself as a child because she had only been exposed to English Literature. She believed people like herself couldn 't possibly exist in literature.…

    • 1143 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Stories can go beyond just tales of fiction, but instead can be directed towards relaying real-life, historical…

    • 1566 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Danger Of A Single Story

    • 349 Words
    • 2 Pages

    The Speaker for the TED Talk on “The Danger of a Single Story” is a native of Nigeria, a country within the continent of Africa, her name is Chimamanda Adichie. She starts out her speech reminiscing on her childhood, during which she divulges her love for reading and writing at an early age. She had been conditioned with the basis of her seemingly normal life, far from stereotypical misconceptions involving countries of Africa. It is not until the speaker moves to the United States that she realizes how dangerous the single story of her people could have been.…

    • 349 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    My sister and I were spending summer of 2007 with my mom and her husband in San Antonio, Texas. It was an early and beautiful Tuesday morning in San Antonio. I woke up with an overwhelming need to talk to my dad that was back home in Dallas, Texas. I called and called and there was no answer, which was very odd since he had been working since 6am. After what seemed like the millionth time trying to reach him somebody picked up the phone.…

    • 1126 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays