A Young People's History of the United States brings to US history the viewpoints of workers, enslaved people, immigrants, women, Black people, Latino Americans, Asian Americans, American Indians, and others whose stories, and their impact, are rarely included in books for young people.

Beginning with a look at Christopher Columbus’s arrival through the eyes of the Arawak Indians, then leading the reader through the struggles for workers’ rights, women’s rights, and civil rights during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and ending with the current protests against continued American imperialism, Zinn presents a radical new way of understanding America’s history. In so doing, he reminds readers that America’s true greatness is shaped by our dissident voices, not our military generals.

A Young People's History of the United States is also a companion volume to The People Speak, the film adapted from A People's History of the United States and Voices of a People’s History of the United States.

“Zinn has written a brilliant and moving history of the American people from the point of view of those who have been exploited … the book is an excellent antidote to establishment history … While the book is precise enough to please specialists, it should satisfy any adult reader.” —Library Journal

“In many years of searching, we have not found one history book we would recommend to them—until [the] just published A Young People's History of the United States. This is the edition of A People's History that we have all been waiting for.” —Deborah Menkart, executive director, Teaching for Change

“Zinn's work exemplifies an approach to history that is radical, regardless of its subject or geographical location. He tells us the untold story, the story of the world's poor, the world's workers, the world's homeless, the world's oppressed, the people who don't really qualify as real people in official histories. Howard Zinn painstakingly unearths the details that the powerful seek to airbrush away. He brings official secrets and forgotten histories out into the light, and in doing so, changes the official narrative that the powerful have constructed for us. He strips the grinning mask off the myth of the benign American Empire. To not read Howard Zinn is to do a disservice to yourself.” —Arundhati Roy

“[Zinn] gives a real insight into history that is often left out of textbooks. Highly recommended.” —Socialist Review

HOWARD ZINN’s (1922–2010) great subject isn’t war, but peace. After his experience as a bombardier in World War II, he became convinced that there could be no such thing as a “just war,” as the vast majority of modern warfare’s victims are made up of innocent civilians. In his books, including A People’s History of the United States and its companion volume, Voices of a People’s History of the United States, Zinn affirms the power of the masses to influence major events. Through a lifetime of pointed scholarship and principled civil disobedience, he has led and continues to lead generations in the ways of peace. View titles by Howard Zinn

Educator Guide for A Young People's History of the United States

Classroom-based guides appropriate for schools and colleges provide pre-reading and classroom activities, discussion questions connected to the curriculum, further reading, and resources.

(Please note: the guide displayed here is the most recently uploaded version; while unlikely, any page citation discrepancies between the guide and book is likely due to pagination differences between a book’s different formats.)

A Note on this Edition
Introduction
Introduction by Ed Morale: A New Narrative

PART ONE
o   Columbus and American Indians
o   Black and White
o   Who Were the Colonists?
o   Tyranny is Tyranny
o   Revolutions
o   The Women of Early America
o   As Long as Grass Grows or Water Runs
o   War with Mexico
o   Slavery and Emancipation
o   The Other Civil War
o   Robber Barons and Rebels
o   The American Empire

PART TWO
o   Class Struggle
o   World War I
o   Hard Times
o   World War II and the Cold War
o   Black Revolt and Civil Rights
o   Vietnam
o   Surprises
o   The Latino Emergence
o   Under Control?
o   Politics as Usual
o   Resistance
o   The End of the Twentieth Century
o   The “War on Terrorism”
o   War in Iraq, Conflict at Home
o   Our Voices Need to be Heard
o   Conclusion by Howard Zinn: “Rise Like Lions”

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Educator Guide for A Young People's History of the United States

Classroom-based guides appropriate for schools and colleges provide pre-reading and classroom activities, discussion questions connected to the curriculum, further reading, and resources.