Slavery and slave trading have been part of human history since ancient times. All peoples, races, regions, and religions have at one time or another participated in human slavery. Historian Sheldon M. Stern has found, however, that state U.S. history standards, curricula, and the media often promote the divisive misconception that slavery was "peculiar" to the United States and that only Europeans and Americans profited from the Atlantic slave trade. We owe it to our children to teach the whole truth about this tragic chapter in African, European, and American history. (Contains 73 notes.)