His book, A People’s History of the United States, has sold millions of copies but ask for it in your local bookstore and you may be lucky to find one copy.
I did this little experiment here in Washington, D. C.—not an area known for its rock-ribbed conservatism—and literally had to blow the dust off of the jacket of the volume the clerk was able to unearth for me. Where I hear about Howard Zinn most frequently is in conversations with students and their parents who have encountered, usually not happily, the bard of Boston University for the first time on a required reading list.
My predecessor at Accuracy in Academia, Dan Flynn, wonders if those lists are the reason for the millions of copies sold. It is a theory worth examining.
“Historian Howard Zinn, through his book, A People’s History of the United States, provided many people with their first glimpse of what the teaching of history could be,” Catherine Capellaro writes in Rethinking Schools magazine. “That book inspired us to look beyond the lives of presidents and generals to the lives of those who have lived at the margins of society.”
“He showed us how ordinary people are responsible for making change.” Zinn granted an interview to Capellaro, the managing editor of Rethinking Schools. He was in vintage form, right down to the unsourced allegations.
“I think it’s very important to show in what way racism and slavery have been so central to the history of our country,” Zinn told Capellaro. “And they’ve been so minimized.”
“To talk about the fact that though we have something called ‘the Progressive Period’ the number of black people lynched during the Progressive Period is greater than any other period in American history.”
The Progressive Period ran from 1890 to 1914. “Although during the first decade of the twentieth century the number of lynchings in America decreased, the brutality of the lynchings increased,” according to the Alabama Department of Archives and History. “This led to pushing African-Americans to the North in search of a safer and freer racial climate.”
Real historians cite sources. Zinn doesn’t. His failure to do so is of particular moment when weighed against the meticulous approach of historians who have shown that slavery had a shorter life span in the United States than just about anywhere else on earth. Some nations still have it.
But then, for Zinn to make such an admission would be a betrayal of his basic principles. Instead, he wants “an honest examination of the history of American foreign policy, a critique of the idea of ‘American exceptionalism’ and arrogance—to look upon the United States as just one other nation in the world, not as one blessed by God to the exclusion of everybody else.”
Unfortunately, Zinn, now retired, gives advice to teachers of today. Even more regrettably, from Colorado to New Jersey to Alabama, whether the course is geography or some form of social studies, pedagogues everywhere seem to be following in the footsteps of the master.
“The teacher has to make a decision right from the start that ‘I am not here just to prepare these students to pass tests so they can move ahead and become successful and take their dutiful place in society,’” Zinn proclaims. “From the start, the teacher has to be bold and, of course, it involves taking risks.”
“It’s always risky for teachers to introduce social issues into the classroom—especially issues that are controversial, that are in the headlines—spying, torture, the war in Iraq,” Zinn warns. “And yet this is something every teacher must do.”
Back to Zinn’s “ordinary people” who so inspired Capellaro. Just who are these unsung American heroes whom Zinn wants to celebrate? Soldiers, sailors, cops, firemen? Not hardly.
“I think we can provide hope by digging out of the archives and out of the newspapers—and wherever they can be found—stories of people who resisted what was going on,” Zinn says. “Give students heroes other than the traditional heroes—other than the presidents of the United States who dominate most history instruction.”
“Give them the story of Cindy Sheehan. Give them the story of the Iraq Veterans Against the War. Give them the story of the environmentalists—the tree huggers—and the people who are protesting what is happening in our forests.”
Malcolm A. Kline is the executive director of Accuracy in Academia.
