Herrera 1

Rafael Herrera Jimnez

Mauricio Lozano

English C1.1

07 March 2016

Introduction

Thesis and objective

Theoretical point of view

As Hayden White noted, history is

Narrative and words is what history is made of 1. It is composed of symbols,

lexical, syntactic and discursive items that stand for a reality to which we can

never have direct access. As Hayden White noted, history is

a verbal structure in the form of a narrative prose discourse that

purports to be a model, or icon, of past structures and processes in the

interest of explaining what they were by representing them. (White 1975: 2)

The work of historians is to put a chaotic collection of facts in order; their

work consists in finding sense among a huge amount of data. There is not a single

1 Words are the minor components of discourse. Narrative is the way in which words,
sentences and major linguistic units are linked in order to produce sense; it is the logic that
coheres each piece of language into a consistent whole.
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way of making history; there are multiple interpretations and methods to study the

past.

On May 2, 20092, Dr. Howard Zinn gave a conference on The Three Holy

Wars: the Revolutionary War, the Civil War and the World War II. According to

Professor Zinns lecture, elites made those wars to obtain benefits for themselves

(Zinn 2015). Those conflicts did not bring any improvement in common peoples

lives (Zinn 2015). It is inferred from this discourse that traditional accounts of

American past have glorified these wars and have ignored some of their

outcomes.

In order to obtain a different view of history, it is necessary to question the

history so far we have been told. In Zinns words:

Its very important to ask about any policy, and especially about war: Who

gained what? And its very important to notice differences among the

various parts of the population. Thats one thing we're not accustomed to in

this country because we dont think in class terms. We think, Oh, we all

have the same interests. For instance, we think that we all had the same

interests in independence from England. We did not have all the same

interests. (Zinn 2015)

2 Dr. Zinn delivered this speech on 2009.

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Zinns approach called attention to the fact that history is what we are told

happened (and not what really happened) and how that is narrated to us. Zinns

version of American history differs from traditional/official texts in the sources and

concepts on which it is based.

Both versions are equally biased.

Class is an essential category for Zinns discourse. It allows him to see

society as composed of different groups, which have dissimilar ways to perceive

reality. Taking this into consideration it is possible to understand why Zinn thinks

history is a matter of perspective. What we think happened depends on the group

we belong to and its particular interests. 3 Not only does the concept of class

produce certain effects on a historians examination of facts, it also interferes with

the researchers selection of evidence. If we wanted to analyze the Industrial

Revolution from the point of view of the workers, we would definitely need to check

documentation produced by them.

Zinns idea about knowledge, neutrality and objectivity.

Traditional / official histories use another set of categories. For these

accounts history consists of the actions done by the great men such as kings,

presidents, scientists, politicians, generals, etc. It is important to notice that history

is carried out by individuals and not by the classes that constitute society as a

whole.4 The idea of nation is another important term for traditional historiography.

In accordance with this conception, people that share the same language and

3 Note that Zinn uses the concept of class in quite a tricky way. What might be
beneficial to a certain class can be
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culture can be grouped together into nations. Again, let us notice that this approach

does not make any class distinctions. On the contrary it conceive the nation as a

whole, as a uniform set of individuals.

Both versions are equally biased.

Zinns idea about knowledge, neutrality and objectivity.

Critiques to his methods (Kazin, WINEBURG)

Zinn advocated for a committed academia, worried by the real problems

that mankind faces. The role of the intellectual must be to find solutions for todays

world; this is the way by which scholars can contribute to society.

Knowledge is a form of power [] This makes knowledge important,

because although it cannot confront force directly, it can counteract the

deception that makes the governments force legitimate. And the knowledge

industry, which reaches seven million young people in colleges and

universities, thus becomes a vital and sensitive locus of power. That power

can be used, as traditionally, to maintain the status quo, or (as in being

demanded by the student rebels) to change it. (Zinn 1971: 6-7)

4 One could argue that the individuals who make history represent a certain
class. However, class distinctions are not relevant in this case, since the logic
of many traditional accounts does not consider the concept of class. A historical
narrative that
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In Zinns view, academia must serve a practical purpose; so do history.

Interpretation of American past is a tool to change (or preserve) the current state of

things. This is the discourse or narrative on which Zinns speech is based.

As we can notice, Zinn thinks history in terms of class: society is made up of

different groups that do not pursue the same objectives; more often than not, these

classes have opposite interests; thus, conflict is inevitable.

However, it is important to be aware that none of them are the truth, or the

past itself; we always deal with representation of things, not with things

themselves. Confusing fiction and reality is dangerous: people might be fooled to

believe and adopt certain ideas. Edward Said; textual attitude

Bibliography.

White, Hayden. Metahistory. The Historical Imagination in Nineteenth-Century

Europe. Baltimore, Maryland: The John Hopkins University Press, 1975.
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Zinn, Howard. "A Just Cause A Just War." 27 January 2015. The Progressive.
Website. 07 March 2016. http://www.progressive.org/zinnjuly09.html
. Th Politics of History. Boston: Beacon Press, 1971.