Howard Zinn Discussion Questions

1. Zinn’s main purpose for writing A People’s History of the United States is to show history from the viewpoint of others.

History of one’s nation can be misleading by only showing the benevolent side, leaving out the mistakes and conflicts. Howard Zinn wrote A People’s History of the United States about the history of America from the viewpoint of the victims to see the genuine side of America. Zinn argued against Kissinger that history should not be the memory of states to hide away conflicts between the victims like the Indians, slaves, and poor whites because these events shaped America to become one of the most powerful nations. The aggressors like Columbus, Cortes, Pizarro, and the English colonists in Virginia and Massachusetts overlooked these conflicts. The viewpoints from the conquered, which gave a wider understanding of history to truly analyze what

Chapter 17 of "A People's History of the United States," titled "Or Does It Explode?" Howard Zinn continues to explore the

Brooke, you make a good point about that Columbus was a genius by venturing on his journey, and who dared to do the impossible for his century. However, he committed acts of violence and brutality with Native Americans, he became a murderer. The Native Americans especially the Arawak Indians were very good, warm, and friendly people who did everything that Columbus wanted. Unfortunately, for them they ran out of gold, and there had started their problems. All For the ambition of a man who is called Cristobal

Zinn, Howard (2005). A People's History of the United States. New York: HarperCollins. ISBN 978-0-06-083865-2. OCLC

Columbus may not have been committing the wrongdoings himself, but it was his example they followed, and his expeditions that started the flood of injustice. “The cruel policy initiated by Columbus and pursued by his successors resulted in complete genocide” explains Bartolome de las Casas. Columbus started a wave of abuse that rippled throughout the Americas by means of the Spaniards that followed in his footsteps. The ceaseless suffering the Native Americans went through lead to mass deaths on top of the cold-blooded murders. Las Casas illustrated the extent of the issue in saying the Spaniards “thought nothing of knifing Indians by the tens and twenties and of cutting slices off them to test the sharpness of their blades.” This type of pointless torment is unjustifiable by any standards and was entirely unnecessary for the colonization of the land. It is hard to call someone a hero if they are responsible for such inhumane acts. Being responsible for such inhumane acts makes it hard to call Christopher Columbus a hero. Columbus’s successors brought his personal actions to a grand scale that ultimately outweigh his

Since 1980, A People’s History of the United States influenced many both young and old, stating untold historical events left out of your conventional history textbook. However, Zinn presents himself as a “Professor of Contempt”, labeled by National Review, rejecting the book as an “anti-American history” book. Repeatedly, Howard Zinn depicts the American story as a result of greed. He believed that every historical leader that took part in our history, their ultimate goal was exploitation and profit. Zinn also intentionally left out substantial American success stories, such as, we were first in flight and first to walk on the moon. He also left out many significant battles, such as Gettysburg and D-Day’s Normandy Invasion. Many critics judge

In the process, this paper also takes on critical views of Zinn and either disagrees with, or reconciles them to argue for why Zinn’s lofty status in American history is well-deserved. Zinn was among a select handful of people in the past century who have most effectively, and lastingly, taught so many of us to critically rethink our understandings of the structures in which we operate, the true value of those structures, and our roles within them. For this, his legacy becomes undeniable.

Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States is a distinct alternative to most mainstream history textbooks. Zinn’s perspective of different complicated historical issues is exemplified through his unique writing and helps the reader understand different convoluted events. The point of view that Zinn chooses allows him to express hardships and struggles through the perspective of America's victims, slaves, African-Americans, Native Americans, the working poor, and the immigrant laborers. By speaking for the voiceless, Zinn is able to provide readers ample detail while looking at sensitive times in American history. Zinn starts with Columbus and progressively moves into recent history; he extensively illustrates the hidden class struggles and the fight to replace a broken political system, but still remains insightful and takes a holistic approach while evaluating American History.

He worked the people too hard, he destroyed the vegetation and the land. Columbus committed genocide, (Felipe Fernandez-Armesto) Volume: 42 “In the opinion of one soi-disant Native American spokesman, 'he makes Hitler look like a juvenile delinquent'.” and he also states that “This sort of hype is doubly unhelpful: demonstrably false, it makes the horrors of the holocaust seem precedented and gives comfort to Nazi apologists making 'genocide' an unshocking commonplace.” (Felipe .F. A.). Christopher Columbus was told by the monarch that he needed to try to “win them by love.”.(Felipe .F. A.). Even Though Columbus tried not to do harm, every move he made cause more and more harm to the natives. In the end the monarch’s had to bring Columbus back to punish him for the wrong that he has done, and he wasted the last few years of his life in anger and misery, and dies still believing that the new world he had discovered was

Throughout time the story of Columbus coming to the Americas has been sugar coated to the point where no one is aware that a group of people were completely annihilated. Howard Zinn believes we should always look at history from both sides but more importantly the side of the inferior. This is because the superior is more likely to exaggerate their findings or plots just like Columbus did when he went to King and Queen Ferdinand. Getting the fact from the inferior provides a more realistic story and how they felt about being attacked. The battle between the Native Americans and Columbus is not a story we tell children in kindergarten. The result of the battle tore apart a culture and race, lives were lost, people were being captured as slaves to bring back to Spain, and many died traveling to Spain. In no way was the meeting of Columbus, the Pilgrims, and the Indians a joyful welcoming

Natives in the Caribbeans were completely eliminated by the Spanish in two decades(source 1). When the Spanish arrived in the caribbeans, they slaughtered the natives there within two generations with no good reason, this inhumane act upon individuals cannot be tolerated, even less celebrated. The Spanish tortured and punished natives Americans in horrible ways(source 2). They did this by cutting off their hands if they did not bring them what they have ordered, chiefs were roasted on fires and dogs were sent to prey on them. “Miserable native survivors started killing themselves by eating poisoned roots”(source 1), this was how horribly they were treated physically and mentally since they thought that their only option was suicide.Columbus has also brought destruction to the natives by bringing slavery to the Americas. This not only affected Natives but also U.S history, since the Spanish Explorers has also brought white dominance over African Americans(source 4), staining U.S culture in a horrific manner. As they brought slavery to the Americas, natives were transported to Europe to be used as slaves, many couldn’t resist and died in this manner. These are the ways in which columbus brought destruction over Native

What is Gordon S. Wood’s argument and what is Howard Zinn’s argument on the nature of the American War for Independence and what evidence do the two historians present to support their interpretations? Who do you think presents the better case?

Much like what Columbus did to the Indians, the Nazi’s did to the Jews. There are people referencing the killing of the natives to the Holocaust. “The real significance of Columbus Day lies in the fact he established the Indigenous Holocaust Formula, leading to the extermination of 70 million to 100 million people Indigenous People and the theft of the Indigenous lands” (Tlaea). This is how the United States is being seen through this national holiday. The Indian prisoners would be burned or hanged to death which led to a majority of them committing suicide. If the prisoners had children they would kill them rather than let the Columbus’ men get them. “In two years, through murder, mutilation, or suicide, half of the 250,000 Indians on Haiti were dead” (Zinn 5). Columbus was finally able to realize that there was not a bit of gold left. The rest of the Indians were used for labor. They were worked extremely hard, to the point where they were dying by the thousands. “By 1550, there were 500. A report of the year 1650 shows none of the original Arawaks or their descendants left on the island” (Zinn 5). “From 1494 to 1508, over three million people had perished from war, slavery, and the mines” (Las Casas). Bartolome de las Casas is an eye witness who was with Columbus through his journey and reported what went on through it all. He states

Public consensus, similar to politics, varies greatly when it comes to American history, especially as it pertains to the classroom. Views about the content and historical interpretation included in history texts have reached a heightened polarization in recent years. This can be seen in the vast differences between the diatribes of Howard Zinn’s, A People’s History of the United States, and Larry Schweikart and Michael Allen’s, A Patriot’s History of the United States. While both books, prescribed by this introductory course into American History, cover many of the same topics, they clearly paint different pictures. I feel that any text seeking to represent a responsible survey of a