VIII. American History According to Zinn

American History According to Zinn

            Howard Zinn was a man of convictions when it came to the concepts of human rights, war, and equality. He had been a professor of political science at Boston University for twenty-four years (1964-1988) and had championed his views on these concepts during his teaching career and after his retirement from Boston University. Zinn firmly believed that political power did not lie in the hands of those who possessed great wealth or military might, but in the hands of the common man. Even in his writings, such as his book A People's History of the United States, Zinn approach the subject of American history from the prespective of a common citizen. By doing so, he recalls the story of America’s past from the prespective that ordinary people, who were put into dire circumstances, shaped historic events instead of the political or economic elite of the time. His passion as a social activist clearly comes through with his writing and his involvement in the 1960s Civil Rights movement of the South seems to be the underlying message of his American history book. A message that history is made because of social changes where people want a better world for the future.

During his tenure at Boston University, he taught a very popular class on civil liberties. The class was not a university requirement, but one that many students took as an elective. In doing so, I would suspect that they wanted to challenge themselves to think about civil rights. With certainty, I suspect that Zinn encourage them to “stand up” to civil injustices. I think that Zinn spoke out about the past in an effort to educate the present. Perhaps he recalled the words of the twentieth century novelist George Santayana who stated this concept most eloquently when he said, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." In Zinn’s views, those who forget about the struggles for human rights, the causes of war, and the inequality in society are condemned to repeat history.