Section outline

  • MON
    9/14
    Gender, Sexuality, and the Family in the Age of Anxiety
    How did the anxieties of the Cold War translate into everyday life and shape postwar norms of gender,  sexuality, and the home?
    SLIDES TO COME

    Primary Sources

    • “Duck and Cover," dir. Anthony Rizzo, Archer Productions, 1951. [LINK]
    • Excerpt from Betty Friedan, Chapter 1, The Feminine Mystique (W.W. Norton, 1963) [PDF]

    Secondary Sources

    • Elaine Tyler May, Chapter 1, Homeward Bound: American Families in the Cold War Era (Basic Books, 2008), 16-36. [PDF]

    Optional

    • John D’Emilio, “The Homosexual Menace” in Making Trouble: Essays on Gay History, Politics, and the University (Routledge, 1992). [PDF]

    Reading Questions

    1. The educational film, "Duck and Cover" reflected a culture of nuclear drills that were common in schools, but also provides a window into what was understood as normal American life in the 1950s. Based on the film, what (and who) was "normal" in the 1950s? And how might the film have shaped young people's understanding of the Cold War and nuclear threat? (We'll discuss Duck and Cover at some length in class)

    2. Historian Elaine Tyler May's Homeward Bound extended the principle of "containment" to the home -- arguing that, in the 1950s, domestic spaces and practices "contained" anxieties about unstable gender and sexual norms. What, according to May, were the psychological stakes of the breadwinner/homemaker household -- and what kinds of sources does she draw on to make this argument? 

    3. Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique challenged the vision of the happy American home and the happy American housewife by highlighting women's dissatisfaction. What does Friedan see as the underlying root of this dissatisfaction, and what is the implied solution? How might Elaine Tyler May interpret Friedan?

    4. And the optional reading: Historian John D'Emilio examines the "Lavender Scare" that played out alongside the "Red Scare" of the 1950s, as the government investigated gay men and lesbians in the State Department. Why were gay men and lesbians perceived to be a threat? And how did this sense of threat reflect underlying anxieties about gender, sexuality, and the family?
     
    WED
    9/16
    Civil Rights Activism in the 1950s
    What were the strategies and goals of the African American civil rights movement after World War II?
    SLIDES TO COME

    Primary Sources

    • Rosa Parks, Conversation at Highlander Folk School, March 4, 1956. [PDF]

    Secondary Sources

    • Francesca Polletta, Chapter 2, “It was Like a Fever,” in It Was Like a Fever: Storytelling in Protest and Politics (University of Chicago Press, 2006), 32-52. [PDF]

    Optional

    • Michael Walzer, “The Young: A Cup of Coffee and a Seat,” Dissent, Spring 1960 [PDF]
    • Joseph L. Locke and Ben Wright, eds., The American Yawp, Chapter 26, “The Affluent Society” (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2019), 288-313. [PDF]

    Reading Questions

    1. The conversation with Rosa Parks took place at the Highlander Folk School in Tennessee—an incubator of civil rights activism throughout the 1950s and 60s. Interviewer and school founder Myles Horton is principally focused on motivation and timing —why and why now? In her own telling, what were Parks's key motivations at the moment she refused to move? And why did other people in Montgomery rally behind her then? 

    2. In our secondary source, sociologist Francesca Polletta challenges some of the popular narratives about protest movements—that is, the narrative of spontaneity—that activists like Rosa Parks and the Greensboro students spontaneously took action. How does Polletta work to re-narrate the histories of these actions? And what's at stake — why is the narrative of spontaneity attractive, and what do we gain by complicating it?

    3. Optional primary source: From the liberal magazine Dissent, Michael Walzer reflects on how and why the tactic of the sit-in took off -- starting in Greensboro, North Carolina, but spreading quickly to other cities. How does Walzer, and the young African Americans he interviews, account for the growth of this protest movement, and its new tactics?

    4. Optional secondary source: The chapter from American Yawp ("The Affluent Society") provides a useful overview of the 1950s civil rights movement and its roots in earlier activism. One key tension here is the use of law and policy to challenge discriminatory practices. To what degree did legal challenges through the courts work to address or end discriminatory practices? What other forms of activism did civil rights activists draw on, and what were their impacts?