Texas school history textbooks are teh suck — here's how, part 1

The Monthly has the first in a three-part series about how Texas public school history textbooks are teh suck. The first piece is good. I'll have to admit that, growing up in New Mexico and reading a book that told me exactly where in today's Morocco he was from, I did not know that "Esteban"'s real given alternative modern dubbed name was Mustafa Azemmouri. 

That said, noting the normal Arabic suffix for place-based surnames, I could have figured that out soon enough, if I operated on the assumption that he had a place-based surname. Also, given that Azemmour was the place where he was sold into slavery, and unknown if it was his birthplace or not, this also may not be totally correct.

In fact, if I recall correctly, from the book I read, he was BORN in the interior of Morocco, so, giving him the name of Mustafa Azemmouri could be putting lipstick on a hog, or, to put it into modern language, substituting one privilege for another.. Mustafa itself is a very common Arabic name, and whatever Arab — I presume that rather than fellow Berber, assuming he was that — may have sold him into slavery may have given him that name. Hell, maybe Arabs used it as a name for slaves they sold in general. Also, "Mustafa" sounds similar enough to "Esteban" it would have made an easy way to give him a Christian first name, whether he was baptized on Dec. 26 or not.

That said? If you asked around GOP Austin, Danny Goeb would say they're great, Strangeabbott would issue a Jesuitical hair-splitting statement while talking about his Mezzican wife, Kenny Boy would try to sell you stock in Pearson and Tim Dunn would pay $1 million to get the SBOE to approve a textbook even more wrong.

THAT said, calling Azemmouri "Black" might not be accurate, either. We have no pictures of Esteban, and he WAS, after all, from Morocco, not Congo. 

So, the first piece is good. But, with this, it falls a touch short of great.