A People's History of the United States Lesson Plan

Zinn, in explaining his theory of history, states that, "Nations are not communities and never have been. The history of any country, presented as the history of a family, conceals fierce conflicts of interest..." What do you make of this claim? How does this first section comply with and/or undermine this assertion?

One of the core tensions in Zinn's book, and in Marxist historicism in general, is the difference between communities of people and the structures of power that rule them. This is often the most difficult concept to grasp for Americans, who are frequently raised to understand their government as an extension of communities, given the promises made by...