A People's History of the United States by Howard Zinn

[okclem]

Anyone interested in learning a non-homogenized, non-whitewashed version of this country's history, would do well to start here. I'm sure this will be moved to the RT, but I'm not starting the thread to discuss or debate its merits. This is real history, warts and all.

 

[MillerHighLife21]

Anyone interested in learning a non-homogenized, non-whitewashed version of this country's history, would do well to start here. I'm sure this will be moved to the RT, but I'm not starting the thread to discuss or debate its merits. This is real history, warts and all.

Does it include citations? One thing I have learned over the years is not to get history lessons without citations. Thanks to the Library of Congress and Google scanning historic documents, checking references online is pretty easy to do.

 

[ChicagoTiger85]

It's a piece of propaganda that edgy high schoolers like to read along with the Bhagavad Gita and JD Salinger


Zinn's influential history textbook has problems, says Stanford education expert
Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States" offers bad lessons in historical thinking, says School of Education Professor Sam Wineburg.

https://news.stanford.edu/news/2012/december/wineburg-historiography-zinn-122012.html


Agit-Prof
Howard Zinn's influential mutilations of American history
https://newrepublic.com/article/112574/howard-zinns-influential-mutilations-american-history


Reclaiming History From Howard Zinn
The left’s portrait of America’s past has triumphed thanks to the abdication of serious historians. Wilfred M. McClay offers an antidote.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/reclaiming-history-from-howard-zinn-11558126202


Lies the Debunkers Told Me: How Bad History Books Win Us Over
Politicians quote them. Movie stars revere them. But these authors are so busy spinning good yarns that they don't have time to research the facts.
https://www.theatlantic.com/nationa...-me-how-bad-history-books-win-us-over/260251/


"Earlier this month, George Mason University's History News Network asked readers to vote for the least credible history book in print. The top pick was David Barton's right-wing reimagining of our third president, Jefferson's Lies: Exposing the Myths You've Always Believed about Thomas Jefferson. But just nine votes behind was the late Howard Zinn's left-wing epic, A People's History of the United States. Bad history, it turns out, transcends political divides.

If these books seem an unlikely pair, they also have a good deal in common. Both flatter their readers by promising to let them in on hidden truths of which most people, and most experts, are unaware. Both offer stark, simplistic accounts (buttressed, in Barton's case, by a litany of historical errors). And both undermine the notion that the past can be rationally interrogated, debated, and revised by people from opposite sides of the ideological spectrum."

Howard Zinn's Biased History
https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/1493

 

[RUBDROC]

There is no Utopia. Even the Garden of Eden had trouble as i recall.
All countries have gone through these things. Many for 1000s of years. America is lucky as we are so new. And in a relative short time have made tremendous progress.

 

[Steven15]

Anyone interested in learning a non-homogenized, non-whitewashed version of this country's history, would do well to start here. I'm sure this will be moved to the RT, but I'm not starting the thread to discuss or debate its merits. This is real history, warts and all.

The book is as much a history book as it is a propaganda piece

 

[AustinTiger77]

Jill Lepore’s “These Truths” is a well researched overview of American History. The citations section at the end is nearly 100 pages.

 

[Goodthinkful]

Anyone interested in learning a non-homogenized, non-whitewashed version of this country's history, would do well to start here. I'm sure this will be moved to the RT, but I'm not starting the thread to discuss or debate its merits. This is real history, warts and all.

Thanks for the book rec, Matt Damon. Did you tear down a Columbus statue this morning? I spent too much of the 90s and early 2000s thinking this was a good book. Total trash, much like the 1619 Project.

 

[ChicagoTiger85]

Jill Lepore’s “These Truths” is a well researched overview of American History. The citations section at the end is nearly 100 pages.

Yes, that's a scholarly liberal history of the country, unlike Zinn's book.

 

[okclem]

Thanks for the book rec, Matt Damon. Did you tear down a Columbus statue this morning? I spent too much of the 90s and early 2000s thinking this was a good book. Total trash, much like the 1619 Project.

No, this morning I got high and masturbated.

 

[ChicagoTiger85]

I wonder what our resident history PhD would have to say about Zinn: @Tigris_Propensus

 

[iceheart08]

Thanks for the book rec, Matt Damon. Did you tear down a Columbus statue this morning? I spent too much of the 90s and early 2000s thinking this was a good book. Total trash, much like the 1619 Project.

Welcome to the board. You'll fit right in.

 

[ChicagoTiger85]

Welcome to the board. You'll fit right in.

Please tell me you don't actually think People's History is accurate.

 

[AustinTiger77]

Yes, that's a scholarly liberal history of the country, unlike Zinn's book.

What’s liberal about it? Have you read it? Would be curious to hear your thoughts.

 

[ChicagoTiger85]

What’s liberal about it? Have you read it? Would be curious to hear your thoughts.

I haven't read it, only reviews of it. It seems like something I ought to read, though. My sense is that it's liberal in the sense that it promotes American patriotism and unity because of certain liberal ideals in the Constitution, but also in that it also emphasizes "nationalistic" failings. In that sense, it sounds like the kind of liberal history that patriotic Americans of all stripes can appreciate, even if they don't agree with the way she presents the details.

Here's a left-wing review: https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/jill-lepore-these-truths-this-america-review/

Here's a right-wing review: https://www.nationalreview.com/magazine/2018/11/17/liberal-history-of-the-u-s/

And something more center-left: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/28/books/review/jill-lepore-this-america.html

 

[AustinTiger77]

I haven't read it, only reviews of it. It seems like something I ought to read, though. My sense is that it's liberal in the sense that it promotes American patriotism and unity because of certain liberal ideals in the Constitution, but in that it also emphasizes "nationalistic" failings. In that sense, it sounds like the kind of liberal history that patriotic Americans of all stripes can appreciate, even if they don't agree with the way she presents the details.

Here's a left-wing review: https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/jill-lepore-these-truths-this-america-review/

Here's a right-wing review: https://www.nationalreview.com/magazine/2018/11/17/liberal-history-of-the-u-s/

And something more center-left: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/28/books/review/jill-lepore-this-america.html

Thank you!

 

[Tigris_Propensus]

@camcgee I’ve never read Zinn- haven’t looked much at American history. From what I can tell by reviews it seems very much in the vein of bottom-up or social history that became popular in the 70’s and 80s. Looks like it focuses on social movements like labor, civil rights, etc. instead of more traditional “great men” narratives. So you’ll hear more about lesser known slave revolts than George Washington, for example.
So it’s a different perspective than most of us probably learned in school, but I’m not sure I could really say it’s “liberal” or “conservative” in the sense people mean today. It’s more about the people than the leaders.

 

[Tigris_Propensus]

As for Jill Lepore, she’s very respected- chaired professor at Harvard, but I think is pretty avowedly feminist in her views, so she’ll probably lean “left” on some issues. She has a pretty cool book about the history of Wonder Woman.

 

[ChicagoTiger85]

@camcgee I’ve never read Zinn- haven’t looked much at American history. From what I can tell by reviews it seems very much in the vein of bottom-up or social history that became popular in the 70’s and 80s. Looks like it focuses on social movements like labor, civil rights, etc. instead of more traditional “great men” narratives. So you’ll hear more about lesser known slave revolts than George Washington, for example.
So it’s a different perspective than most of us probably learned in school, but I’m not sure I could really say it’s “liberal” or “conservative” in the sense people mean today. It’s more about the people than the leaders.

You wouldn’t be reading Zinn in a history class, I suppose. Thanks for the response.