American Society and Popular Culture 1920–1970

1. There was a very famous entertainment statement that was created during this time and it was established as the roaring twenties. Just the name itself says so much about this time period. During this time it new styles and new tastes in music were starting to rise. The main attraction that changed during this time was the more modern style of music. People started moving to cities instead of farms which was a big social change and made people what we like to call more hip and raw. Baseball, movies, music, and radios during this time started to become extremely popular and were played or watched more than ever. This was the time of jazz because everyone wanted happy music for after the war.

2. The most far reaching change was political. Many women believed that it was their right and duty to take a serious part in politics. They recognized, too, that political decisions affected their daily lives. When passed in 1920, the Nineteenth Amendment gave women the right to vote. With this being said I believe that women gained more and had more change because they had more of a perspective and many women believed that they should be able to do more not only for their spouses but for their country as well.

3. The 1920's were an age of dramatic social and political change. For the first time, more Americans lived in cities than on farms. The nation's total wealth more than doubled between 1920 and 1929, and this economic growth swept many Americans into an affluent but unfamiliar consumer society. All Americans I believe were affected no matter who you really where it was all a cluster and many suffered and many didn’t but because of the strength of the culture many believed that when some suffered we all suffered and it was our duty to come back on top and become better in the future.

4. McCarthyism, name given to the period of time in American history that saw Wisconsin Sen. Joseph McCarthy produce a series of investigations and hearings during the 1950s in an effort to expose supposed communist infiltration of various areas of the U.S. government. This not only let our priceless information in some areas but it made the United States vulnerable to almost anything, it was like the whole country was going to war with nothing but a right sock and a pencil, which if you get that pretty much means we were helpless. Joseph McCarthy had a major impact by creating an atmosphere of hysteria and paranoia in the early fifties. People were scared of the Soviet Union after the atomic bomb had been set up in the USSR. McCarthy claimed that communists were infiltrated like the Rosenbergs in many sectors of American society and thus betrayed their motherland to serve the interests of the Soviet Union. He even drafted lists that were completely unreliable. A witch hunt was carried on in the army and even in Hollywood and the entertainment industry. It lasted until 1953 when McCarthy finally resigned.

5. The Fifties Spiritual Marketplace explores the major Catholic-Protestant tensions of the decade, the conflict between theology and popular faith, and the underground forms of ’50s religiosity – the interest in the beat poets and writers, Zen Buddhism, UFOs, Thomas Merton monasticism and the Joseph Campbell Carl Jung revival of mythology. Ellwood describes ’50s religious trends in the context of political events such as the Cold War, McCarthyism, the Korean War, and the civil rights movement. Because of these events that happened the religious areas of the united states had changed and shifted because we were no longer representing what we first set out to be.

6. The Revolution brought myriad consequences to the American social fabric. There was no reign of terror as in the French Revolution. There was no replacement of the ruling class by workers' groups as in revolutionary Russia. How then could the American Revolution be described as radical? Nearly every aspect of American life was somehow touched by the revolutionary spirit. From slavery to women's rights, from religious life to voting, American attitudes would be forever changed.

6.1. Protests were very important because it was the rise of these protests and we had never seen them before. It was a new thing a new way for people to get what they wanted to say hear. And for the first time, many people who might be alone came together with others who thought the same way and protested with each other and they were strong and better altogether. Many protests worked very well others not so much but it wasn’t always about winning sometimes it was about just sending a message for the people in higher positions to live within the back of their heads

7. Protests were very important because it was the rise of these protests and we had never seen them before. It was a new thing a new way for people to get what they wanted to say hear. And for the first time, many people who might be alone came together with others who thought the same way and protested with each other and they were strong and better altogether. Many protests worked very well others not so much but it wasn’t always about winning sometimes it was about just sending a message for the people in higher positions to live within the back of their heads.

8. Mostly these changes were in women beforehand women were very close and kept to themselves and didn’t really show off anything if you may. The 1960s were an age of fashion innovation for women. The early 1960s gave birth to drainpipe jeans and capri pants, which were worn by Audrey Hepburn. The casual dress became more unisex and often consisted of plaid button-down shirts worn with slim blue jeans, comfortable slacks, or skirts.The late 60's saw the beginning of the 'hippie' movement. Women wore relaxed, flowing clothes with psychedelic prints that were made of tie-dye fabrics and began to reject the need to look 'made up. The fashion trends of the 1960's helped shape a society which accepted freedom and self-expression through clothing.

9. The women's liberation movement was a political alignment of women and feminist intellectualism that emerged in the late 1960's and continued into the 1980's primarily in the industrialized nations of the Western world, which affected great change (political, intellectual, cultural) throughout the world. The WLM branch of radical feminism, based in contemporary philosophy, comprised women of racially- and culturally-diverse backgrounds who proposed that economic, psychological, and social freedom were necessary for women to progress from being second-class citizens in their societies.

10. After siding with the French in numerous battles during the French and Indian War and eventually being forcibly removed from their homes under Andrew Jackson’s Indian Removal Act, Native American populations were diminished in size and territory by the end of the 19th century. The Indian Civil Rights Act is signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson, granting Native American tribes many of the benefits included in the Bill of Rights.

11. The impact of the 1965 Amendments to the Immigration and Nationality Act, also known as the Hart Cellar Act, was a surprise to policymakers and many experts. The primary intent of the 1965 Act was to repeal the national origin quotas enacted in the 1920s, which were considered discriminatory by the children and grandchildren of southern and eastern European immigrants. The advocates of reform in the 1960s were not pushing for a major new wave of immigration. Their expectation was that there would be a small increase of arrivals from Italy, Greece, and a few other European countries as families that were divided by the immigration restrictions of the 1920s were allowed to be reunited, but that no long-term increase would result.

12. Popular culture and mass media in the 1950's. In the 1950's, financial prosperity allowed young Americans to participate in a shared culture of rock and roll music, movies, and television. Also, a growing group of Americans spoke out against inequality and injustice during the 1950's. African Americans had been fighting against racial discrimination for centuries; during the 1950's, however, the struggle against racism and segregation entered the mainstream of American life.