Nov. 14, 2005
back to syllabus               New!  Link to second paper instructions

 Some Aspects of Depression Culture   

Before we start discussing Depression-era culture, I'd like to hear your reactions to the Scottsboro documentary we watched on Wednesday.  Did you think it was well done as a documentary film?  Had you heard of the Scottsboro case at all before this?  What did the case tell you about racism in thirties America?  Are there any heroes in the case?  Do you think there could be (or has been) a case comparable to Scottsboro in recent America? 

I. Some Aspects of Depression Culture  

    A. A Common Culture?

    B. A Workers' Culture?

    C. A Consumer Culture?

II. A Common Culture?  A Search for Security?
    A. "New Media"--Early Twentieth-Century Style: Photography, Recordings, Radio, Movies
        1. "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction"--Walter Benjamin
        2. "While political historians generally see [the 1930s] as the age of Franklin D. Roosevelt, cultural historians are more likely to call it the age of Mickey Mouse, a culture-hero of international significance."--Warren Susman, cultural historian

    B. The Federal Government and Cultural Policy--Uplift and/or Democracy?
            Large on-line WPA Poster Exhibit
    C. Homogeneity or Pluralism?

    D. Regionalism in a National Culture

III. A Workers' Culture?
    A. The Popular Front and the "Cultural Front"

    B. Realism or Utopianism?

Walter Benjamin                                 Steamboat Willie