Immediately following the second World War, America entered the decade of the 1950’s which would be a time of major social and cultural change. The economy in the 1950’s was thriving, and a decrease in poverty percentages arose which benefitted those of the generation (Brinkley). However, during this time period America underwent a nationwide revolution as a result of the Cold War (Kennedy 877). Critical areas of American life such as space travel, arms development and the acquisition of foreign alliances such as North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) were formed, all to oppose the communist political ideology (Kennedy 877). This decade also became a turning point in the widespread development of music, with the introduction of rock and …show more content…
Beginning in the 1940’s and stretching into the 1990’s America took part in a nonviolent war with the Soviet Union, known as the Cold War (Kennedy 870). This would be a war fought mainly over the political ideologies of capitalism vs. communism (Kennedy 870). The United States and its people holding the capitalist point of view would come to fear the idea of communism infiltrating their home country (Kennedy 870). This fear would come to impact the lives of people in the U.S. greatly. In order to convey the serious message of anti-communism to younger generations, the U.S. used “media that were more appealing to children... comic books, schools and textbooks” (“The Cold War”). By using this type of media it would be the most effective way of portraying this message since children could still enjoy their literature but at the same time be learning the true American capitalistic way of life. For example one source of propaganda that was released in 1951 was known as Childrens Crusade against communism (“The Cold War”). This would use cards in bubble gum packs that held anti-communist slogans using bright colors, and cartoons making them appealing to children to read (“The Cold War”). In the same year the duck-and-cover method was enforced. Within schools, there would be drills regarding what to do in the event of …show more content…
The Beat Generation was founded in the early 1940’ s but was mainly developed throughout the 50’s. Some of its major influences were Jack Kerouac, known as the generations founder, Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Allen Ginsberg, each with their own social impact in society (Rahn). The majority of those within the movement were from the middle class but educated in public policies as well (Rahn). The major points that were argued by this generation were that Capitalism was really a policy that hurt Americans more than it helped them and it would come to “question the materialism” of the 50’s society. In a book known as Howl published by Allen Ginsberg within the time period would come to challenge the view of pornography (Rahn). A trial was conducted and it was found that fictional writings were not to be impacted by “censorship” (Rahn). Not all members of society enforced the outbreak of this ideology. Recorded in 1958, Reverend Bernard P. Donachie was quoted in The New York Times as saying “the Beat Generation had flourished because they are simply the product of twisted confusion” (“PRIEST BELITTLES...”). This quote shows that traditionalists were still fighting the upcoming open minded generation to preserve their own cultural values. The Beat Generation, in a crucial period in history would greatly impact the minds of people. At the same
The Cold War was a pivotal time in American history. To a greater degree than most other wars, the Cold War affected American society in unfathomable and profound ways. More specifically, American culture transformed immensely during this time. From a constant state of anxiety, to changes in media and the arts, to McCarthyism; the Cold War fervently affected the quality of life, personal expression, and American politics. Predominantly, the Cold War inflicted fear and apprehension within the American people that was so overpowering that it affected every aspect of their lives and overall American culture.
The 1950s and the 1960s had many similarities, though they had many differences as well. Their similarities and differences include: the politics, the economy, the society, and the culture of both decades. In the 1950s, North Korea moved into South Korea and began a civil war between the two parallel countries. The reason for this dispute was the border lines as well as guerrilla fighting in the South, which created a greater tension on the issue. The reason why the U.S entered the Korean War was so that the Soviet Union would not gain another nation and, in turn, more power. Like the 50s, our country was also at war with another country in the 60s. This time, the U.S was at war with Vietnam. The U.S entered the war because the
The values of the modern American society have changed drastically from how they were sixty years ago, in the 1950s. The values of today’s society consist of relationships (social), appearances (clothes), and items of possessions (technology).
The 1950s is considered to be the model decade of America. Families were close, children respected their elders, workers worked hard to provide for their families who grew up in nice neighborhoods, and the economy was booming. The forced conformity, neglect of the poor, and segregation are often overlooked when talking about the decade as they were during the time period. The 1950s were a prodigious time period for family life but not for the individual or societal ethics.
“The rise of rock ‘n’ roll and the reception of it, in fact, can tell us a lot about the culture and values of the United States in the 1950s. According to historians James Gilbert, there was a struggle throughout the decade ‘over the uses of popular culture to determine who would speak to what audience, and for what purpose”. At the center of that struggle, rock ‘n’ roll unsettled a nation had been “living in an ‘age of anxiety’” since 1945” (p.15). Altschuler talks about how music and race interlock with one another. Rock had become a “highly visible and contested arena for struggles over racial identity and cultural and economic empowerment in the United States” (p.35). Other chapters within the book state the battles involving sexuality, generational conflicts, as well as other social issues. The author states ideas that are somewhat problematic. For example, he states that there is a myth that rock ‘n’ roll went into a “lull” following the payola hearings (the practice of record promoters paying DJs or radio programmers to play their labels ' songs) of 1959 and did not come about again until the arrival of the Beatles in 1964.
Over the past (almost) hundred years, society and education have both changed drastically. Typically, the things that have happened in history, such as wars, technological advances, and changes in culture, changed education as a result. Some of these changes include popular culture in the 1920s, economic factors in the 1930s, military intervention in the 1940s, Sputnik in the 1950s, and racial issues in the 1960s. One theme of education is that it has gradually become more important over the years. Before high school diplomas could be rare, and today most high school graduates go to college in the United States.
The beat generation was a movement that sought to oppose American society values, and any sort of control. They explored Eastern religions, was somewhat postmodernism, rejected the materialistic culture, spoke about drugs, our conscious mind, and fought for sexual liberation and exploration with their unapologetically offensive language. While reading the novel Jitterbug Perfume written by Tom Robbin, one can witness how the novel exhibits aspects of the beat literature, and thus concluding that the beat generation served as inspiration to Tom Robbin.
Since the 1800’s, popular culture has changed for better but at the same time for the worse. Beginning during minstrels shows and blackface, the face of African Americans were demonized. With the beginning of minstrels shows during the nineteenth century the music world began to sky rocket. With the beginning of Blues which developed into Jazz, that both became the genre of the people. Then with the beginning of hip-hop music which was an industry full of African American Artist.
” Williams’ theory therefore suggests that the terms must necessarily co-exist in order to define each other. The “pervasiveness of consent ” therefore characterises the fifties, against which these Beat texts can be contrasted. Theodore Roszak’s 1969 article ‘The Making of a Counterculture,’ helps define beat ideology as “heightened self-expression and often a rejection of political and authoritative institutions… a negative spirit of the times coupled with a specific lifestyle .” Both On the Road and Howl and their author’s lifestyles of their writers reflect this criterion, in idiomatic and contextual terms, lending to the notion that they are, by the overall nature of their existence, countercultural texts. Roszak’s adolescent counterculture often seems the embodiment of Dean and Sal’s ‘beatitude’ in On the Road “when they pulse to music…value what is raunchy… flare against authority, seek new experience, ” but it is similarly descriptive of the naked, sometime vulgar language Ginsberg employs in Howl “who bit detectives in the neck… let themselves be fucked in the ass.” (13) The Beats admire the vibrancy naturally present among youth, and although this is a style for which their writing has been criticised, it is a move away from the traditionally
Propaganda played a major role in the Cold War. In a 1947 comic book, the idea of the future was depicted as, “Communists infiltrate nearly every aspect of America, including subverting the Speaker of the House, before assassinating both the President and Vice-President...” (Document 7 caption) while showing chaos and crisis under communist rule. The cover of the book shows a frantic disarray of people screaming and a burning American flag, implying the damage Soviet Union will bring. The comic book sent a message to Americans that communism will bring horror, murder, and utter chaos to the US if allowed to spread and take over
The Beatniks, also called the Beats, were the members of a literary movement that first appeared in the United States of America around 1950. The name given to this movement was « the Beat Generation » or simply the Beat movement. Three names of those members often stand out together as the founding fathers of this movement, thanks to their works which allowed to set forth the movement across the United States and the world and to spread their ideas : Jack Kerouac with his ode-to-freedom novel On The Road, Allen Ginsberg with his censured-poem Howl and William S. Burroughs and his novel Naked Lunch. The name of the movement has been explained by Jack Kerouac itself,
Jack Kerouac was one of a group of young men who, immediately after the Second World War, protested against what they saw as the blandness, conformity and lack of cultural purpose of middle-class life in America. The priorities of people of their age, in the mainstream of society, were to get married, to move the suburbs, to have children and to accumulate wealth and possessions. Jack Kerouac and his friends consciously rejected this pursuit of stability and instead looked elsewhere for personal fulfillment. They were the Beats, the pioneers of a counterculture that came to be known as the Beat Generation. The Beats saw mainstream life as a prison. They wanted freedom, the freedom to pick up and go at a moments notice. This search for
The entire Beat Generation began with a small group of boys who had all attended Columbia University at one point or another (Watson 29-38). The term Beat Generation was initially coined in 1948 within the context of this era by their leader, Jack Kerouac, stating that they were a generation having been “beaten” into consciousness (Watson 3). Four years later, in 1942 the term was introduced to the public at large by writer Clellon Holmes in an article for the New York Times he titled, “This Is the Beat Generation” (Watson 3). In his article he describes “beatness” as being, “more than mere weariness, it implies the feeling of having been used, of being raw. It involves a certain nakedness of mind, and ultimately
When writers and poets of post World War II America started questioning the mainstream and accepted social conventions of society, a cultural and literary movement was born. During the postwar economic boom several progressive university students started asking such profound questions as: How do we as a society move beyond runaway capitalism and rampant materialism? How can we enlighten people to live beyond the oppressive prudery of the previous generation? These expansive thinkers used art and literature to rally against social norms and became the ultimate contrarians to all of society and common thought. These artistic provocateurs became known as ‘Beats” and their movement became known as The Beat Generation (Encyclopedia Britannica, 2013).
"The one thing that we yearn for in our living days, that makes us sigh and groan and undergo sweet nauseas of all kinds, is the remembrance of some lost bliss that was probably experienced in the womb and can only be reproduced (though we hate to admit it) in death." (Kerouac, Jack. “On the road.”). This quote, from Jack Kerouac’s book On the Road, is a brilliant example of the overall feel of the Beat Generation. Jack Kerouac is one of the most influential writers of the Beat Generation, rivaled only by the likes of Allen Ginsberg and William S. Burrough. But what exactly is the Beat Generation? What does it mean? Who of note was involved? When did it take place? The “Beat Generation” is a play on words, implying that the participants