Summary

Chapter 5 is titled “Honest Abe Lied to Me.” In this chapter, the author describes how his understanding and experience of America’s history changed throughout the three stages of his early education. In elementary school, he says, he was part of a racially mixed group of students. They learned about American history through the lens of white teachers and curriculum, with an emphasis on how Abraham Lincoln was a leader in the movement to free Black slaves. There was also, he adds, Black History Month, which he always looked forward to. And then, at one point, he got to play Abraham Lincoln in a school pageant. That, he says, gave him a real thrill, to embody the sort of freedoms that he had been taught had been implemented by Lincoln.

Then, the author says, in middle school he went...