A People's History of the United StatesFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A People's History of the United States
2003 hardcover edition
AuthorHoward Zinn
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
SeriesA People's History
SubjectAmerican history, American politics, American foreign
policy,American economics
PublisherHarper & Row; HarperCollins
Publication
date
1980 (1st edition); 2009 (most recent edition)
Media typePrint (Hardback & Paperback)
Pages729 pp (2003 edition)
ISBNsee Current editions section
OCLC50622172
LC Class E178 .Z75 2003
A People's History of the United States is a 1980 non-fiction book by American historian and political
scientist Howard Zinn. In the book, Zinn seeks to present American history through the eyes of the
common people rather than political and economic elites. A People's History has been assigned as
reading in many high schools and colleges across the United States.[1] It has also resulted in a change in
the focus of historical work, which now includes stories that previously were ignored.[2] The book was a
runner-up in 1980 for the National Book Award. It has been frequently revised, with the most recent
edition covering events through 2005. In 2003, Zinn was awarded the Prix des Amis du Monde
Diplomatique for the French version of this book, Une histoire populaire des États-Unis.[3] More than two
million copies have been sold.
Reviews have been mixed. Some have called it a brilliant tool for advancing the cause of social equality.
Others have called the book a revisionist patchwork containing errors.
In a 1998 interview, Zinn said he had set "quiet revolution" as his goal for writing A People's History.
"Not a revolution in the classical sense of a seizure of power, but rather from people beginning to take
power from within the institutions. In the workplace, the workers would take power to control the
conditions of their lives."[4] In 2004, Zinn edited a primary source companion volume with Anthony
Arnove, entitled, Voices of a People's History of the United States.
Contents
[hide]
1 Overview
o 1.1 Columbus to the Robber Barons
o 1.2 The Twentieth Century
2 Critical reception
3 Other editions and related works
o 3.1 Younger readers' version
o 3.2 Lessons for the classroom
4 Current editions
5 See also
6 References
7 External links
Overview[edit]
In a letter responding to a 2007 critical review of his A Young People’s History Of The United States (a
release of the title for younger readers) in The New York Times Book Review, Zinn wrote:
My history... describes the inspiring struggle of those who have fought slavery and racism (Frederick
Douglass, William Lloyd Garrison, Fannie Lou Hamer, Bob Moses), of the labor organizers who have
led strikes for the rights of working people (Big Bill Haywood, Mother Jones, César Chávez), of the
socialists and others who have protested war and militarism (Eugene V. Debs,Helen Keller, the
Rev. Daniel Berrigan, Cindy Sheehan). My hero is not Theodore Roosevelt, who loved war and
congratulated a general after a massacre of Filipino villagers at the turn of the century, but Mark Twain,
who denounced the massacre and satirized imperialism.[5][6]
I want young people to understand that ours is a beautiful country, but it has been taken over by men
who have no respect for human rights or constitutional liberties. Our people are basically decent and
caring, and our highest ideals are expressed in the Declaration of Independence, which says that all of
us have an equal right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” The history of our country, I point
out in my book, is a striving, against corporate robber barons and war makers, to make those ideals a
reality — and all of us, of whatever age, can find immense satisfaction in becoming part of that.[7]
Columbus to the Robber Barons[edit]
Chapter 1, "Columbus, the Indians, and Human Progress" covers early Native American civilization
in North America and the Bahamas, the genocide and enslavement committed by the crew
of Christopher Columbus, and incidents of violent colonization by early settlers. Topics include
the Arawaks, Bartolomé de las Casas , the Aztecs, Hernán Cortés , Pizarro,Powhatan, the Pequot,
the Narragansett, Metacom, King Philip's War, and the Iroquois.
Chapter 2, "Drawing the Color Line" addresses the early enslavement of Africans and servitude of
poor British people in the Thirteen Colonies. Zinn writes of the methods by which he says racism was
artificially created in order to enforce the economic system. He argues that racism is not natural
because there are recorded instances of camaraderie and cooperation between black slaves and white
servants in escaping from and in opposing their subjugation.
Chapter 3, "Persons of Mean and Vile Condition" describes Bacon's Rebellion, the economic conditions
of the poor in the colonies, and opposition to their poverty.
Chapter 4, "Tyranny is Tyranny" covers the movement for "leveling" (economic equality) in the colonies
and the causes of the American Revolution. Zinn argues that the Founding Fathers agitated for war to
distract the people from their own economic problems and stop popular movements, a strategy that he
claims the country's leaders would continue to use in the future.
Chapter 5, "A Kind of Revolution" covers the war and resistance to participating in war, the effects on
the Native American people, and the continued inequalities in the new United States. When the land of
veterans of the Revolutionary War was seized for non-payment of taxes, it led to instances of resistance
to the government, as in the case of Shays' Rebellion. Zinn wrote that "governments - including the
government of the United States - are not neutral... they represent the dominant economic interests,
and... their constitutions are intended to serve these interests."[8]
Chapter 6, "The Intimately Oppressed" describes resistance to inequalities in the lives of women in the
early years of the U.S. Zinn tells the stories of women who resisted the status quo, including Polly
Baker, Anne Hutchinson, Mary Dyer, Amelia Bloomer, Catharine Beecher, Emma Willard, Harriot
Hunt, Elizabeth Blackwell, Lucy Stone, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Margaret Fuller, Sarah
Grimké, Angelina Grimké, Dorothea Dix, Frances Wright, Lucretia Mott , and Sojourner Truth.
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.
Howard Zinn,
A People’s History of the United States[9]
Chapter 7, "As Long As Grass Grows or Water Runs" discusses 19th century conflicts between the U.S.
government and Native Americans (such as the Seminole Wars) and Indian removal, especially during
the administrations of Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren.
Chapter 8, "We Take Nothing By Conquest, Thank God" describes the Mexican-American War. Zinn
writes that President James Polk agitated for war for the purpose of imperialism. Zinn argues that the
war was unpopular, but that newspapers of that era misrepresented the popular sentiment.
Chapter 9, "Slavery Without Submission, Emancipation Without Freedom" addresses slave rebellions,
theabolition movement, the Civil War, and the effect of these events on African-Americans. Zinn writes
that the large-scale violence of the war was used to end slavery instead of the small-scale violence of
the rebellions because the latter may have expanded beyond anti-slavery, resulting in a movement
against the capitalist system. He writes that the war could limit the freedom granted to African-
Americans by allowing the government control over how that freedom was gained.
Chapter 10, "The Other Civil War", covers the Anti-Rent movement, the Dorr Rebellion, the Flour Riot of
1837, the Molly Maguires, the rise of labor unions, the Lowell girlsmovement, and other class
struggles centered around the various depressions of the 19th century. He describes the abuse of
government power by corporations and the efforts by workers to resist those abuses. Here is an excerpt
on the subject of the Great Railroad Strike of 1877:[10][11]
Chapter 11, "Robber Barons and Rebels" covers the rise of industrial corporations such as the railroads
and banks and their transformation into the nation's dominant institutions, with corruption resulting in
both industry and government. Also covered are the popular movements and individuals that opposed
corruption, such as the Knights of Labor, Edward Bellamy, the Socialist Labor Party, the Haymarket
martyrs, the Homestead strikers, Alexander Berkman, Emma Goldman, Eugene V. Debs, the American
Railway Union, theFarmers' Alliance, and the Populist Party.
The Twentieth Century[edit]
Chapter 12, "The Empire and the People", covers American imperialism during the Spanish-American
War and the Philippine-American War, as well as in other lands such asHawaii, Guam, and Puerto Rico.
The Teller Amendment. Zinn portrays the wars as being racist and imperialist and opposed by large
segments of the American people.
Chapter 13, "The Socialist Challenge", covers the rise of socialism and anarchism as popular political
ideologies in the United States. Covered in the chapter are the American Federation of Labor (which
Zinn argues provided too exclusive of a union for non-white, female, and unskilled workers; Zinn argues
in Chapter 24 that this changes in the 1990s),Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), Mary Harris
"Mother" Jones, Joe Hill, the Socialist Labor Party, W. E. B. Du Bois, and the Progressive Party (which
Zinn portrays as driven by fear of radicalism).
Chapter 14, "War is the Health of the State" covers World War I and the anti-war movement that
happened during it, which was met with the heavily enforced Espionage Act of 1917. Zinn argues that
the United States entered the war in order to expand its foreign markets and economic influence.
Chapter 15, "Self-Help in Hard Times" covers the government's campaign to destroy the IWW, and the
factors leading to the Great Depression. Zinn states that, despite popular belief, the 1920s were not a
time of prosperity, and the problems of the Depression were simply the chronic problems of the poor
extended to the rest of the society. Also covered is the Communist Party's attempts to help the poor
during the Depression.
Chapter 16, "A People's War?", covers World War II, opposition to it, and the effects of the war on the
people. Zinn, a veteran of the war himself, notes that "it was the most popular war the US ever
fought,"[12] but states that this support may have been manufactured through the institutions of American
society. He cites various instances of opposition to fighting (in some cases greater than those
during World War I) as proof. Zinn also argues against the US' true intention was not fighting against
systematic racism such as the Jim Crow laws (leading to opposition to the war from African-Americans).
Another argument made by Zinn is that the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not
necessary, as the U.S. government had already known that the Japanese were considering surrender
beforehand. Other subjects from WWII covered include Japanese American internment and
the bombing of Dresden. The chapter continues into the Cold War. Here, Zinn writes that the U.S.
government used the Cold War to increase control over the American people (for instance, eliminating
such radical elements as the Communist Party) and at the same time create a state of permanent war,
which allowed for the creation of the modern military-industrial complex. Zinn believes this was possible
because both conservatives and liberals willingly worked together in the name of anti-Communism. Also
covered is the US' involvement in the Greek Civil War, the Korean War, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg,
and the Marshall Plan.
Chapter 17, "'Or Does It Explode?'" (named after a line from Langston Hughes's poem "Harlem" from
"Montage of a Dream Deferred", referred to as "Lenox Avenue Mural" by Zinn), covers the Civil Rights
movement. Zinn argues that the government began making reforms against discrimination (although
without making fundamental changes) for the sake of changing its international image, but often did not
enforce the laws that it passed. Zinn also argues that while nonviolent tactics may have been required
for Southern civil rights activists, militant actions (such as those proposed by Malcolm X) were needed
to solve the problems of black ghettos. Also covered is the involvement of the Communist Party in the
movement, the Congress of Racial Equality, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee,
the Freedom Riders, COINTELPRO, and the Black Panther Party.
Chapter 18, "The Impossible Victory: Vietnam", covers the Vietnam War and resistance to it. Zinn
argues that America was fighting a war that it could not win, as the Vietnamese people were in favor of
the government of Ho Chi Minh and opposed the regime of Ngo Dinh Diem, thus allowing them to keep
morale high. Meanwhile, the American military's morale for the war was very low, as many soldiers were
put off by the atrocities that they were made to take part in, such as the My Lai massacre. Zinn also tries
to dispel the popular belief that opposition to the war was mainly amongst college students and middle-
class intellectuals, using statistics from the era to show higher opposition from the working class. Zinn
argues that the troops themselves also opposed the war, citing desertions and refusals to go to war, as
well as movements such as Vietnam Veterans Against the War. Also covered is the US invasions of
Laos and Cambodia, Agent Orange, the Pentagon Papers, Ron Kovic, and raids on draft boards.
Chapter 19, "Surprises", covers other movements that happened during the 1960s, such as second-
wave feminism, the prison reform/prison abolition movement, the Native American rights movement,
and the counterculture. People and events from the feminist movement covered include Betty
Friedan's The Feminine Mystique, Women's International Terrorist Conspiracy from Hell, Patricia
Robinson, the National Domestic Workers Union, National Organization for Women, Roe v.
Wade, Susan Brownmiller's Against Our Will, and Our Bodies, Ourselves. People and events from the
prison movement covered include George Jackson, the Attica Prison riots, and Jerry Sousa. People and
events from the Native American rights movement covered include the National Indian Youth
Council, Sid Mills, Akwesasne Notes , Indians of All Tribes, the First Convocation of American Indian
Scholars, Frank James, the American Indian Movement, and the Wounded Knee incident. People and
events from the counterculture covered include Pete Seeger, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Malvina
Reynolds, Jessica Mitford's The American Way of Death, Jonathan Kozol, George Dennison, and Ivan
Illich.
Chapter 20, "The Seventies: Under Control?", covers American disillusion with the government during
the 1970s and political corruption that was exposed during the decade. Zinn argues that the resignation
of Richard Nixon and the exposure of crimes committed by the CIA and FBI during the decade were
done by the government in order to regain support for the government from the American people without
making fundamental changes to the system; according to Zinn, Gerald Ford's presidency continued the
same basic policies of theNixon administration. Other topics covered include protests against
the Honeywell Corporation, Angela Davis, Committee to Re-elect the President, the Watergate
scandal,International Telephone and Telegraph's involvement in the 1973 Chilean coup d'état,
the Mayagüez incident , Project MKULTRA, the Church Committee, the Pike Committee, theTrilateral
Commission's The Governability of Democracies, and the People's Bi-Centennial.
Chapter 21, "Carter-Reagan-Bush: The Bipartisan Consensus", covers the Jimmy Carter, Ronald
Reagan, and George H. W. Bush administrations and their effects on both the American people and
foreign countries. Zinn argues that the Democratic and Republican parties keep the government
essentially the same (that is, they handled the government in a way that was favorable for corporations
rather than for the people) and continued to have a militant foreign policy no matter which party was in
power. Zinn uses similarities between the three administrations' methods as proof of this. Other topics
covered include the Fairness Doctrine, the Indonesian invasion of East Timor, Noam Chomsky, global
warming, Roy Benavidez, the Trident submarine, the Star Wars program, the Sandinista National
Liberation Front, the Iran-Contra Affair, the War Powers Act, U.S. invasion of Lebanon during
the Lebanese Civil War, the Invasion of Grenada, Óscar Romero , the El Mozote massacre, the 1986
Bombing of Libya, the collapse of the Soviet Union, the United States invasion of Panama, and the Gulf
War.
Chapter 22, "The Unreported Resistance", covers several movements that happened during the Carter-
Reagan-Bush years that were ignored by much of the mainstream media. Topics covered include
the anti-nuclear movement, the Plowshares Movement, the Council for a Nuclear Weapons Freeze,
the Physicians for Social Responsibility, George Kistiakowsky, The Fate of the Earth, Marian Wright
Edelman, the Citizens' Clearinghouse for Hazardous Wastes, the Three Mile Island accident,
the Winooski 44, Abbie Hoffman ,Amy Carter, the Piedmont Peace Project, Anne Braden, César
Chávez, the United Farm Workers, the Farm Labor Organizing Committee, Teatro Campesino , LGBT
social movements, the Stonewall riots, Food Not Bombs, the anti-war movement during the Gulf
War, David Barsamian, opposition to Columbus Day, Indigenous Thought, Rethinking Schools, and
the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990.
Chapter 23, "The Coming Revolt of the Guards", covers Zinn's theory on a possible future radical
movement against the inequality in America. Zinn argues that there will eventually be a movement made
up not only of previous groups that were involved in radical change (such as labor organizers, black
radicals, Native Americans, feminists), but also members of the middle class who are starting to become
discontented with the state of the nation. Zinn expects this movement to use "demonstrations,
marches, civil disobedience; strikes and boycotts and general strikes; direct action to redistribute wealth,
to reconstruct institutions, to revamp relationships."[13]
Chapter 24, "The Clinton Presidency", covers the effects of the Bill Clinton administration on the U.S.
and the world. Zinn argues that, despite Clinton's claims that he would bring changes to the country, his
presidency kept many things the same as in Reagan-Bush era. Topics covered include Jocelyn Elders,
the Waco Siege, the Oklahoma City bombing, the Crime Bill of 1996, the Antiterrorism and Effective
Death Penalty Act of 1996, the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of
1996, the 1993 bombing of Iraq, Operation Gothic Serpent, the Rwandan Genocide, the War in Bosnia
and Herzegovina, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the North American Free Trade
Agreement, the 1998 bombing of Afghanistan and Sudan, the Impeachment of Bill Clinton, Barbara
Ehrenreich's Nickel and Dimed, Stand for Children, Jesse Jackson, the Million Man March, Mumia Abu-
Jamal, John Sweeney, the Service Employees International Union, the Union of Needletrades, Industrial
and Textile Employees, the Worker Rights Consortium, the Poor People's Economic Human Rights
Campaign, the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Telecommunications Act of 1996, Spare
Change News, theNorth American Street Newspaper Association, the National Coalition for the
Homeless, anti-globalization, and WTO Ministerial Conference of 1999 protest activity.
Chapter 25, "The 2000 Election and the 'War On Terrorism'", covers the 2000 presidential election and
the War on Terrorism. Zinn argues that attacks on the U.S. by Arab terrorists(such as the September
11, 2001 attacks) are not caused by a hatred for our freedom (as claimed by President George W.
Bush), but by grievances with U.S. foreign policies such as "stationing of U.S. troops in Saudi
Arabia... sanctions against Iraq which... had resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of children;
[and] the continued U.S. support ofIsrael's occupation of Palestinian land."[14] Other topics covered
include Ralph Nader, the War in Afghanistan, (though notably absent is any mention of
the Taliban government in control in Afghanistan at the time, the war being launched, according to Zinn,
based merely on the belief that bin Laden was hiding in the country) and the USA PATRIOT Act.
Critical reception[edit]
When A People's History of the United States was published in 1980, future Columbia
University historian Eric Foner reviewed it in The New York Times:
Professor Zinn writes with an enthusiasm rarely encountered in the leaden prose of academic history,
and his text is studded with telling quotations from labor leaders, war resisters and fugitive slaves. There
are vivid descriptions of events that are usually ignored, such as the Great Railroad Strike of 1877 and
the brutal suppression of the Philippine independence movement at the turn of this century. Professor
Zinn's chapter on Vietnam—bringing to life once again the free-fire zones, secret bombings, massacres
and cover-ups—should be required reading for a new generation of students now facing conscription.
Blacks, Indians, women, and laborers appear either as rebels or as victims. Less dramatic but more
typical lives — people struggling to survive with dignity in difficult circumstances — receive little
attention. ...A People's History reflects a deeply pessimistic vision of the American experience.
Foner called for "an integrated account incorporating Thomas Jefferson and his slaves, Andrew
Jackson and the Indians, Woodrow Wilson and the Wobblies."[15]
Taking a negative view of the book, Harvard University historian Oscar Handlin wrote in a review in The
American Scholar:
Hence the deranged quality of this fairy tale, in which the incidents are made to fit the legend, no matter
how intractable the evidence of American history. It may be unfair to expose to critical scrutiny a work
patched together from secondary sources, many used uncritically (Jennings, Williams), others ravaged
for material torn out of context (Young, Pike). Any careful reader will perceive that Zinn is a stranger to
evidence bearing upon the people about whom he purports to write. But only critics who know the
sources will recognize the complex array of devices that pervert his pages... On the other hand, the
book conveniently omits whatever does not fit its overriding thesis... It would be a mistake, however, to
regard Zinn as merely Anti-American. Brendan Behan once observed that whoever hated America
hated mankind, and hatred of mankind is the dominant tone of Zinn's book... He lavishes indiscriminate
condemnation upon all the works of man — that is, upon civilization, a word he usually encloses in
quotation marks.[16]
In the Washington Post Book World, reviewer Michael Kammen, a professor of American History, wrote:
I wish that I could pronounce Zinn's book a great success, but it is not. It is a synthesis of the radical
and revisionist historiography of the past decade. . . Not only does the book read like a scissors and
paste-pot job, but even less attractive, so much attention to historians, historiography and
historical polemic leaves precious little space for the substance of history. . . . We do deserve a people's
history; but not a simpleminded history, too often of fools, knaves and Robin Hoods. We need a
judicious people's history because the people are entitled to have their history whole; not just those
parts that will anger or embarrass them. . . . If that is asking for the moon, then we will cheerfully settle
for balanced history.[17]
Writing in The New York Times, columnist Bob Herbert wrote:
Mr. Zinn was often taken to task for peeling back the rosy veneer of much of American history to reveal
sordid realities that had remained hidden for too long. [...] What was so radical about believing that
workers should get a fair shake on the job, that corporations have too much power over our lives and
much too much influence with the government, that wars are so murderously destructive that
alternatives to warfare should be found, that blacks and other racial and ethnic minorities should have
the same rights as whites, that the interests of powerful political leaders and corporate elites are not the
same as those of ordinary people who are struggling from week to week to make ends meet?[18]
Writing in Dissent, Georgetown University history professor Michael Kazin argued that Zinn is too
focused on class conflict, and wrongly attributes sinister motives to the American political elite. He
characterized the book as an overly simplistic narrative of elite villains and oppressed people, with no
attempt to understand historical actors in the context of the time in which they lived. Kazin wrote:
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.
[19]
Kazin argued that A People's History fails to explain why the American political-economic model
continues to attract millions of minorities, women, workers, and immigrants, or why the socialist and
radical political movements Zinn favors have failed to gain widespread support among the American
public.
Writing in The Chronicle of Higher Education, Christopher Phelps, associate professor of American
studies in the School of American and Canadian Studies at the University of Nottingham wrote:
Professional historians have often viewed Zinn's work with exasperation or condescension, and Zinn
was no innocent in the dynamic. I stood against the wall for a Zinn talk at the University of Oregon
around the time of the 1992 Columbus Quincentenary. Listening to Zinn, one would have thought
historians still considered Samuel Eliot Morison's 1955 book on Columbus to be definitive. The crowd
lapped it up, but Zinn knew better. He missed a chance to explain how the social movements of the
1960s and 1970s have transformed the writing and teaching of history, how his People's History did not
spring out of thin air but was an effort to synthesize a widely shared shift in historical sensibilities. Zinn's
historical theorizing, conflating objectivity with neutrality and position with bias, was no better.
The critics would be churlish, however, not to acknowledge the moving example Zinn set in the civil-
rights and Vietnam movements, and they would be remiss not to note the value of A People's History,
along with its limitations. Zinn told tales well, stories that, while familiar to historians, often remained
unknown to wider publics. He challenged national pieties and encouraged critical reflection about
received wisdom. He understood that America's various radicalisms, far from being "un-American," have
propelled the nation toward more humane and democratic arrangements. And he sold two-million copies
of a work of history in a culture that is increasingly unwilling to read and, consequently, unable to
imagine its past very well.[20]
In The New York Times Book Review in a review of A Young People’s History Of The United States,
volumes 1 and 2, novelist Walter Kirn wrote:
That America is not a better place — that it finds itself almost globally despised, mired in war, self-doubt
and random violence — is also a fact, of course, but not one that Zinn’s brand of history seems equal to.
His stick-figure pageant of capitalist cupidity can account, in its fashion, for terrorism — as when, in the
second volume, subtitled “Class Struggle to the War on Terror,” he notes that Sept. 11 was an assault
on “symbols of American wealth and power” — but it doesn’t address the themes of religious zealotry,
technological change and cultural confusion that animate what I was taught in high school to label
“current events” but that contemporary students may as well just call “the weirdness.” The line from
Columbus to Columbine, from the first Independence Day to the Internet, and from the Boston Tea
Partyto Baghdad is a wandering line, not a party line. As for the “new possibilities” it points to, I can’t see
them clearly.[21]
Other editions and related works[edit]
A version of the book titled The Twentieth Century contains only chapters 12-25 ("The Empire and the
People" to "The 2000 Election and the 'War on Terrorism'"). Though it was originally meant to be an
expansion of the original book, recent editions of A People's History now contain all of the later chapters
from it.
In 2004, Zinn and Anthony Arnove published a collection of more than 200 primary source documents
titled Voices of a People's History of the United States, available both as a book and as a CD of
dramatic readings. Writer Aaron Sarver notes that although Kazin "savaged" Zinn’s A People’s History
of the United States, "one of the few concessions Kazin made was his approval of Zinn punctuating 'his
narrative with hundreds of quotes from slaves and Populists, anonymous wage-earners and ... articulate
radicals.'"[22]
Whether Zinn intended it or not, Voices serves as a useful response to Kazin’s critique. As Sarver
observes, "Voices is a vast anthology that tells heartbreaking and uplifting stories of American history.
Kazin will be hard-pressed to charge Zinn with politicizing the intelligence here; the volume offers only
Zinn’s sparse introductions to each piece, letting the actors and their words speak for themselves." [22]
In 2008, Zinn worked with Mike Konopacki and Paul Buhle on creating A People's History of American
Empire, a graphic novel that covers various historic subjects from A People's History of the United
States as well as Zinn's own history of involvement in activism and historic events as covered in his
autobiography You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train.
Zinn worked as the series editor for a series of books under the A People's History label. This series
expands upon the issues and historic events covered in A People's History of the United States by
giving them in-depth coverage, and also covers the history of parts of the world outside the United
States. These books include[citation needed]:
A People's History of the Supreme Court by Peter Irons with Foreword by Zinn [23]
A People's History of Sports in the United States by Dave Zirin with an introduction by Howard Zinn
A People's History of American Empire (American Empire Project) by Howard Zinn, Mike
Konopacki, and Paul Buhle
The Darker Nations: A People's History of the Third World by Vijay Prashad
A People's History of the American Revolution by Ray Raphael
A People's History of the Civil War by David Williams[disambiguation needed]
A People's History of the Vietnam War by Jonathan Neale
The Mexican Revolution: A People's History by Adolfo Gilly
Likewise, other books were inspired by the series:
A People's History of Australia from 1788 to the Present edited by Verity Burgmann. A four-volume
series that looks at Australian history thematically, not chronologically.
A People's History of Science: Miners, Midwives, and Low Mechanicks by Clifford D Connor.
A People's History of the World by Chris Harman. It is endorsed by Zinn.
A People's History of Christianity by Diana Butler Bass.
Younger readers' version[edit]
In July 2007 Seven Stories Press released A Young People's History of the United States, an illustrated,
two-volume adaptation of A People's History for young adult readers (ages 10–14). The new version,
adapted from the original text by Rebecca Stefoff, is updated through the end of 2006, and includes a
new introduction and afterword by Howard Zinn.
In his introduction, Zinn writes, "It seems to me it is wrong to treat young readers as if they are not
mature enough to look at their nation's policies honestly. I am not worried about disillusioning young
people by pointing to the flaws in the traditional heroes." In the afterword, "Rise like lions", he asks
young readers to "Imagine the American people united for the first time in a movement for fundamental
change."
In addition, the New Press released an updated (2007) version of The Wall Charts for A People's
History — a 2-piece fold-out poster featuring an illustrated timeline of U.S. history, with an explanatory
booklet.
Lessons for the classroom[edit]
In 2008, the Zinn Education Project was launched to promote and support the use of A People's History
of the United States (and other materials) for teaching in middle and high school classrooms across the
U.S. The goal of the project is to give American students accurate and complete versions of U.S.
history, with full historical complexity.[24] With funds from an anonymous donor who had been a student
of Zinn, the project began by distributing 4,000 packets to teachers in all states and territories. The
project now offers teaching guides and bibliographies that can be freely downloaded.[25]
Current editions[edit]
Zinn, Howard (2005). A People's History of the United States: 1492-present. Harper Perennial
Modern Classics. ISBN 0-06-083865-5.
Zinn, Howard (2003). A People's History of the United States: 1492-present. HarperCollins. ISBN 0-
06-052842-7.
Zinn, Howard (1999). A People's History of the United States: 1492-present. HarperCollins. ISBN 0-
06-019448-0.
Zinn, Howard (1995). A People's History of the United States: 1492-present. HarperCollins. ISBN 0-
06-092643-0.
Zinn, Howard (1980). A People's History of the United States. Harper & Row. ISBN 0-06-014803-9.
Zinn, Howard (2003). The Twentieth Century. Harper Perennial. ISBN 0-06-053034-0
Zinn, Howard (2005). Arnove, Anthony, ed. Voices of a People's History of the United States.
Seven Stories Press. ISBN 1-58322-628-1.
A Young People's History of the United States, adapted from the original text by Rebecca Stefoff;
illustrated, in two volumes; Seven Stories Press, New York, 2007
Vol. 1: Columbus to the Spanish-American War. ISBN 978-1-58322-759-6
Vol. 2: Class Struggle to the War on Terror. ISBN 978-1-58322-760-2
Teaching Editions
A People's History of the United States: Teaching Edition
A People's History of the United States, Abridged Teaching Edition, Updated Edition
A People's History of the United States: Volume 1: American Beginnings to Reconstruction,
Teaching Edition
A People's History of the United States, Vol. 2: The Civil War to the Present, Teaching Edition
A People's History of the United States: The Wall Charts; designed by Howard Zinn and George
Kirschner; New Press (2007). ISBN 978-1-56584-171-0
See also[edit]
People's history
Chris Harman 's A People's History of the World a more general volume, cited by Zinn as a global
companion to his book.
A Patriot's History of the United States written as a conservative response to A People's History of
the United States.
Page Smith was the author of an eight-volume history of the same name, the first volume of which
appeared in 1976, four years before Zinn's book was published.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_People's_History_of_the_United_States