Howard Zinn
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Revision as of 01:34, 31 March 2011
Howard Zinn was a left-wing historian who taught Political Science from 1964 to 1988. He described himself as 'something of an anarchist, something of a socialist. Maybe a democratic socialist'.[1] He is probably best known for his book A People's History of the United States. He was a World War II veteran and criticized "collateral damage" that occurred in the firebombing of Dresden and the nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. He is also a great source of pro-activism quotes.
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View of History
One of the more controversial things about Howard Zinn was that he did not believe in an unbiased approach to history.[2] He once said 'there is no such thing as impartial history'.[3] His greatest concern with the standard narrative of history was not that facts are distorted, but that certain things are omitted and that what is perceived as important ultimately depends on the values of the historian.[4] His frank admissions of bias have of course made it easy for many of his opponents to criticise him, as if they were exposing something everyone did not already know.[5]
A People's History of the United States
“”If you look through high school textbooks and elementary school textbooks in American history, you will find Andrew Jackson the frontiersman, soldier, democrat, man of the people — not Jackson the slaveholder, land speculator, executioner of dissident soldiers, exterminator of Indians.
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| —Howard Zinn |
Zinn's historical narrative is best viewed through the explanation he gives above. It is meant to serve as an antidote to the heroes and villains of grade school history. However, Zinn consciously switches the roles. As Eric Foner writes:
“”Friedrich Nietzsche once identified three approaches to the writing of history: the monumental, the antiquarian and the critical, the last being history "that judges and condemns." Howard Zinn, who died on January 27 at 87, wrote the third kind. Unlike many historians, he was not afraid to speak out about the difference between right and wrong.
... I have long been struck by how many excellent students of history first had their passion for the past sparked by reading Howard Zinn. Sometimes, to be sure, his account tended toward the Manichaean, an oversimplified narrative of the battle between the forces of light and darkness. But A People's History taught an inspiring and salutary lesson--that despite all too frequent repression, if America has a history to celebrate it lies in the social movements that have made this a better country. As for past heroes, Zinn insisted, one should look not to presidents or captains of industry but to radicals such as Frederick Douglass, Susan B. Anthony and Eugene V. Debs.[6] |
Zinn is good if you want to get right to the seedy underbelly of American history. However, it's necessary to keep in mind that his work is based around a Marxist class conflict view of history and copious amounts of economic determinism. In his attempt to rebut "establishment" history that (supposedly) makes heroes of statesmen and the elite, Zinn gives an inverse view in which historical actors are shoehorned into the role of oppressor and oppressed. This seems to give Zinn cause to do some of his own whitewashing, of which there are a number of examples throughout his history. The Conquistadors play the role of oppressor against the Aztecs, yet the role of the Aztec Empire itself as an oppressor is glossed over. Settlers' attacks on the Pequot are described, but the Pequots' attacks are downplayed. Michael Kazin writes:
“”The ironic effect of such portraits of rulers is to rob "the people" of cultural richness and variety, characteristics that might gain the respect and not just the sympathy of contemporary readers. For Zinn, ordinary Americans seem to live only to fight the rich and haughty and, inevitably, to be fooled by them. They are like bobble-head dolls in work-shirts and overalls-ever sanguine about fighting the powers-that-be, always about to fall on their earnest faces.[7]
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Zinn, of course, makes no bones about the fact that he has an ax to grind.
CPUSA involvement
After his death in 2010, the FBI dropped docs on Zinn:
“”Zinn was born in Brooklyn, New York and died at the age of 87 on January 27, 2010. As a young man he worked as a shipyard hand and served in the U. S. military as a bombardier during World War II. Returning from the war, he became involved in a number of left-wing political causes, some of them associated with the activities of the Communist Party of the United States (CPUSA).
In 1949, the FBI opened a domestic security investigation on Zinn (FBI File # 100-360217). The Bureau noted Zinn’s activities in what were called Communist Front Groups and received informant reports thatZinn was an active member of the CPUSA; Zinn denied ever being a member when he was questioned by agents in the 1950s. In the 1960s, the Bureau took another look at Zinn on account of his criticism of the FBI’s civil rights investigations. Further investigation was made when Zinn traveled to North Vietnam with Daniel Berrigan as an anti-war activist. The investigation ended in 1974, and no further investigation into Zinn or his activities was made by the FBI.[8]
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Quotes
“”If we remember those times and places—and there are so many—where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction.
And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory. |
| —[9] |
“”I'm worried that students will take their obedient place in society and look to become successful cogs in the wheel - let the wheel spin them around as it wants without taking a look at what they're doing. I'm concerned that students not become passive acceptors of the official doctrine that's handed down to them from the White House, the media, textbooks, teachers and preachers.
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| —[10] |
Footnotes
- ↑ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Zinn#Socialism
- ↑ http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/28/us/28zinn.html
- ↑ http://www.countercurrents.org/prasoon100210.htm
- ↑ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMt7cFFKPeM
- ↑ http://bighollywood.breitbart.com/jdboreing/2010/08/03/howard-zinn-hollywoods-favorite-communist-historian/
- ↑ Foner on Zinn
- ↑ Kazin on Zinn
- ↑ Howard Zinn FBI records
- ↑ http://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/1899.Howard_Zinn
- ↑ http://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/1899.Howard_Zinn