American History
According to ‘A people’s history of the United States’ by Howard Zinn (2015), history is the basic memory of a nation, and the nationals of that state should not take it as their own. From the discovery of America, it is said that executioners like Christopher Columbus and Cortes, among others, disrupted the peace and law that existed before their arrival. The paper will discuss my thoughts if Zinn’s teachings and opinions about American history.
The teachings of Zinn emphasize the view of the history of America from the viewpoint of the victims like the Arawaks because many historians aim to crown the heroes falsely. He further explains that he does not want to denounce the executioner’s and grieve the victims because it will only bring memories of the past and deplete our present moral energy.
Additionally, he says that historical lines are always unclear since it’s a sequence of victims lashing out their anger to other victims from desperation and culture that oppressed them; thus, the oppressor can also be a victim. As a writer, he attempts to show history as a past in which people fought for their freedom and occasionally won instead of showing historians having an endless cycle of defeat. It is clear from history that many governments have used the pretense of having common interests with its people to trap them through politics and culture. Zinn wants to paint all the extremists that executioner’s like Columbus, Cortes, Pizarro, and the Virginian English Settlers.
In conclusion, American history is vital to today’s generation to know what happened and the fight to freedom in truth. However, we need to teach the Millenials not to rely so much on history because it will only bring hard feelings of pain that will affect our present moral energy.
Reference
Zinn, H. (2015). A people’s history of the United States: 1492-present.History is a weapon. Routledge. Retrieved from http://www.historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/zinncol1.html