palavore
Full Member
I put my pants on just like the rest of you -- one leg at a time. Except, once my pants are on, I make gold posts.
Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.
Posts: 298
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Post by palavore on Jan 28, 2010 20:53:39 GMT -5
Famous American historian and author of A People's History of the United States (1980), Howard Zinn dies at 87 years of age. As a child America's schools you're taught a history of war. With Howard Zinn you learn about the history from the bottom up, of the struggle and progress of small people and their great social movements. I'm really going to miss this profound man...  |
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Post by betahat on Feb 1, 2010 2:34:28 GMT -5
I've been meaning to read some of his books for a while - I only know him through reputation and the occasional article he wrote for the Nation in his later years. Definitely one of the big icons of the American left that experienced the horrors of WWII and/or Korea and then led the opposition to the Vietnam war. I guess his books get criticized a lot by some academic historians for inaccuracies, lack of context and balance, but I'm sure Zinn would agree that his primary purpose was polemical and political. To paraphrase Marx,
"the historians have only interpreted the world, the point is to change it."
In any case, given how inaccurate and unbalanced the standard version of American History (as taught in American public schools) happens to be, his versions are undoubtedly a much needed corrective. If only there had been a Canadian version of Howard Zinn writing about Canadian history I might have paid attention back in Middle School...
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Post by Ganbare! on Feb 1, 2010 3:50:14 GMT -5
History is a subjective and biased discipline so I don't think there is one education system in this world teaching *real* History...
As for Howard Zinn, he's definitely part of the non-academic book writers in the vein of Alan Greenspan, it makes an interesting read but doesn't contribute conceptually much to the field.
Typically, the pseudo-intellectual releases mainstream media cover so often either for marketing reasons or because of journalists' lack of proficiency.
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palavore
Full Member
I put my pants on just like the rest of you -- one leg at a time. Except, once my pants are on, I make gold posts.
Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.
Posts: 298
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Post by palavore on Feb 1, 2010 4:31:48 GMT -5
^ I don't know what you mean by "non-academic". He was certainly part of Academia. No, he didn't study one thing to death. He was a big picture scholar and deserves a certain distinction. ^^ Marx was influenced by Hegel and like all (Young) Hegelians seek an overthrow of history, that is, to not repeat it, but to make progress. Ronald Takaki was another historian who challenged the master narrative taught in public schools. He died May of last year. He was Berkley professor and I cited some of his works before on this forum. He wrote about Asian American history and the multicultural history of the United States. He fought for introduction of ethnic studies into the university curriculum and was the first professor to teach a black history course at UCLA in 1967... He also challenged the Japanese government to include their own minorities into the master narrative taught in their schools. I really miss him too. I don't know if society can still produce such great intellectuals. Recent history has made us such a complacent crop. His works 1971 -- A Pro-slavery Crusade: The Agitation to Reopen the African Slave Trade. 1978
1978 -- Iron cages: race and culture in nineteenth-century America.
1984 -- Pau Hana: Plantation Life and Labor in Hawaii, 1835-1920.
1989 -- Strangers from a Different Shore: A History of Asian Americans.
1993 -- Violence in the Black Imagination: Essays and Documents.
1993 -- A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America.
1994 -- Issei and Nisei: The Settling of Japanese America
1994 -- From the Land of Morning Calm: The Koreans in America.
1994 -- From Different Shores: Perspectives on Race and Ethnicity in America.
1994 -- Ethnic Islands: The Emergence of Urban Chinese America.
1995 -- Lives of Notable Asian Americans: Business, Politics, Science with Angelo Ragaza.
1995 -- India in the West: South Asians in America.
1995 -- Hiroshima: Why America Dropped the Atomic Bomb.
2001 -- Double Victory: A Multicultural History of America in World War II.
2002 -- Debating Diversity: Clashing Perspectives on Race and Ethnicity in America.
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Post by admin on Feb 1, 2010 12:49:26 GMT -5
palavore: you'd be happy to know that Prof. Takaki was gentle and humble in person, and made time for even for even the most poorly-formed questions from sleep-deprived undergraduates, so long as they were made in earnest. He cut such a small figure on campus, shuffling along with his parka and backpack - he's missed, but the product of his work is profound and plentiful.
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Post by betahat on Feb 1, 2010 22:18:55 GMT -5
^As for Howard Zinn, he's definitely part of the non-academic book writers in the vein of Alan Greenspan, it makes an interesting read but doesn't contribute conceptually much to the field.
I would think of him as a popularizer and compiler of revisionist academic histories of America from the 50s and 60s, but more than that a public intellectual, eloquent spokeperson and political activist. I haven't read any of Greenspan's books but I doubt he will be remembered for his writings as much as for his tenure as chair of the Federal Reserve and his coining the term "irrational exuberance."
I've been reading a bit of revisionist Israeli history "The Accidental Empire" by Gershom Gorenburg and it's quite fascinating. Israel probably has the most interesting and highly politicized revisionist history movements as the history is not that old, there are still many living witnesses, and all of their history is politicized in a way that much of US history is not.
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palavore
Full Member
I put my pants on just like the rest of you -- one leg at a time. Except, once my pants are on, I make gold posts.
Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.
Posts: 298
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Post by palavore on Feb 2, 2010 11:26:58 GMT -5
^ The Israeli right wing succeeds in representing itself on the international stage and with that you get their version/concept of their state uncontested. I heard recently on NPR that the left wing Israeli politicians have even stopped bailing out arrested peace activists, whereas the Likud has already moved on to expunging the criminal records of settlers who resisted their relocation off Palestinian lands. palavore: you'd be happy to know that Prof. Takaki was gentle and humble in person, and made time for even for even the most poorly-formed questions from sleep-deprived undergraduates, so long as they were made in earnest. He cut such a small figure on campus, shuffling along with his parka and backpack - he's missed, but the product of his work is profound and plentiful. Aye, here's to good men!  |
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