I think you answer your own question: " . . .I detest the motives why black history or women's history is pushed on us."
Many Americans are automatically suspicious of any woman or black person who is lauded by historians or activists as a hero; if she was that important, wouldn't I have heard of her? It thus becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy; attempts to educate are seen as attempts to indoctrinate, and there's already a wide-spread assumption that the accomplishments of minorities must be exaggerated, anyway.
Also, Tubman was definitely more of a doer than a talker/writer, and she didn't (as far as I'm aware . . .) leave a body of quotable speeches or essays that make for easy inclusion in textbooks or soundbites. As opposed to e.g. Sojourner Truth, who, I'd say, is much more well-known due in no small part to her quotability.
Incidentally, I've known of Tubman since I was a child, and I was definitely taught of her in school; this was in a state which didn't exist during the Civil War, so one may safely assume nationwide rather than regional educational biases regarding the era.
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Date: 2011-11-27 11:20 pm (UTC)Many Americans are automatically suspicious of any woman or black person who is lauded by historians or activists as a hero; if she was that important, wouldn't I have heard of her? It thus becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy; attempts to educate are seen as attempts to indoctrinate, and there's already a wide-spread assumption that the accomplishments of minorities must be exaggerated, anyway.
Also, Tubman was definitely more of a doer than a talker/writer, and she didn't (as far as I'm aware . . .) leave a body of quotable speeches or essays that make for easy inclusion in textbooks or soundbites. As opposed to e.g. Sojourner Truth, who, I'd say, is much more well-known due in no small part to her quotability.
Incidentally, I've known of Tubman since I was a child, and I was definitely taught of her in school; this was in a state which didn't exist during the Civil War, so one may safely assume nationwide rather than regional educational biases regarding the era.