Howard Zinn at MIT 2005 - The Myth of American Exceptionalism

Howard Zinn (1922-2010) offers a talk at MIT titled “The Myth of American Exceptionalism,” on March 14, 2005. He is the inaugural lecturer in the series “Myths About America” organized by MIT’s Special Program for Urban and Regional Studies (SPURS), which is hosted at MIT’s Department of Urban Studies and Planning. He is introduced by Bish Sanyal, director of the SPURS/Hubert Humphrey Program.

Howard Zinn is renowned as the author of “A People’s History of the United States” (1980). Historian, playwright and self-described democratic socialist, Zinn was chair of the history and social sciences department at Superman College, and political science professor at Boston University. 

Please visit the MIT Infinite History site here. 

Trump Calls Howard Zinn's Work "Propaganda." Hear the Legendary Historian in His Own Words.  Howard Zinn (1922-2010) was an American historian, playwright, and socialist thinker. He was chair of the history and social sciences department at Spelman College, and a political science professor at Boston University. Zinn wrote over 20 books, including his best-selling and influential A People's History of the United States.

We all have a common story. We are moving toward a related way of being. 

The inaugural States of Change Learning Festival opens with award-winning author and thinker Tyson Yunkaporta. We're also joined by Angie Tangaere!  

We’re accustomed to a certain way of thinking. We want the world to be simple, but we talk about it in complicated ways. Indigenous thinking is different. It knows the world is complex and finds deep ways to communicate this knowledge through pictures, carving, stories. What happens if we bring an Indigenous perspective to the big picture - to history, education, money, power? Can we, in fact, have proper concepts of sustainable life without Indigenous knowledge?

Tyson Yunkaporta is an academic, an arts critic, and a researcher who is a member of the Apalech Clan in far north Queensland. He carves traditional tools and weapons and also works as a senior lecturer in Indigenous Knowledges at Deakin University in Melbourne. He lives in Melbourne.

Luisah Teish will speak at The Natural Way about learning to love the Earth, our Mother, and will share her personal stories of growing up in the South and her relationship to the land. She will recount and examine cultural myths that have mis-educated us into alienation from Our Mother Earth.

Renee Lertzman, Ph.D. is a researcher, writer and communications consultant, focusing specifically on the psychological dimensions of sustainability. She gave a lecture to the Social Sustainability Colloquium at Portland State University (PSU), Portland, Oregon on February 4, 2010 on the topic, The Myth of Apathy or Why People Don't Seem to Care About Sustainability.

Renee has been involved in the sustainability sector for two decades. She has consulted and worked with numerous organizations, and her research has received recognition for its innovation and insight. She holds a master's degree in Communication Studies from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and a doctoral degree from the Cardiff School of Social Sciences at Cardiff University, UK, where she trained and developed psychosocial research methodologies applied to sustainability. Her work has been featured in the New York Times "Dot Earth," KBOO Radio, and The Ecologist. More about Renee on her Website.