Spring 2005

“Proud Decades or the Age of Anxiety”?

American Culture and Politics, 1945-1960

HISTORY 410/510

The American political and cultural landscape from 1945-1960 offers a series of competing and paradoxical images. For some contemporaries and subsequent observers, the 15 years following the end of World War II were “the proud decades,” a period of unparalleled prosperity and prestige for America both at home and abroad. It was an era marked by good jobs, stable families and communities, an expanding middle class, positive labor-management relationships, and a broad political consensus that gave Americans a clear sense of unity and common purpose. These impressions have been reinforced over the last few decades by popular culture, which has often presented nostalgic images of the 1950s and depicted the period as a time of “happy days,” especially in contrast to the social turmoil and uncertainty that subsequently emerged to dominate both public and private life.

For others, however, the post World War II period leading up to the 1960s was an “age of anxiety” marked by social conformity and complacency. In their view, the threat of thermo-nuclear war, the domestic consequences of Cold War tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union, rising racial unrest, the use of homophobia as a political weapon, and a series of widely publicized scandals were developments that marred the appearance of consensus and stability, leaving behind a troubled and complex legacy. Although theirs was a minority opinion, social critics during the 1950s repeatedly voiced these concerns and have been supported by many historians who have reached similar conclusions. More recently, however, there has been a counterattack against this kind of historical revisionism, and the 1950s are again being praised as an exemplary period of achievement in American politics, culture, and foreign policy.

The aim of this course is to grapple with these contested views of American politics and culture and better understand this crucial period that so profoundly shaped late twentieth-century American history and continues to have relevance for our own times. We will draw on a variety of sources and materials to help us in this quest, including film, memoirs, novels, primary documents, and historical accounts. Students will be asked to write several short essays and a longer final paper as requirements for the class, in addition to participating actively in discussions based upon the readings.

Class Requirements:

1. 3-5 page essay analyzing reaction to Brown v Board of Education: Due April 14
2. 5-7 page review of Peyton Place: Due May 5
3. Take-home final exam

Please Note: Academy honesty is integral to both one’s personal integrity and the integrity of the class. Plagiarism or other forms of cheating are serious offenses and are unacceptable.

Format:

Tuesday’s class will be largely done in a lecture style with Thursday primarily reserved for discussion. Film clips will be used extensively throughout the term. Your participation in discussions, along with comments and questions you have during lectures, is strongly encouraged.

Grading:

1. Brown v Board of Education essay- 20%
2. Peyton Place review- 25%
3. Final Paper- 40%
4. Attendance and Participation- 15%

Graduate Students

Graduate students taking this course as History 510 will write a 15-20 page paper due at the end of the term as their major class assignment. A prospectus outlining your topic will be due by April 14. Graduate students will also meet separately with the instructor on several occasions during the term to discuss the weekly readings.

Readings :

Most of the readings are available in a class packet that can be purchased at the UO Bookstore. It is noted in the syllabus as “Packet.”

Books for the course include:

Grace Metalious, Peyton Place
Jack Metzgar, Striking Steel: Solidarity Remembered,
Michael Harrington, The Other America: Poverty in the United States

The readings will also be placed on reserve at Knight Library.

Syllabus:

Week I: (March 29, 31) Introduction, The Election of 1948 No Class, March 31

James H. Rowe Oral History Interview, Truman Presidential Library and Museum, “The Politics of 1948,” Appendix B, 127-161. Packet

Week II (April 5,7) The Cold War and McCarthyism (Film: “Point of Order”)

John D’Emilio, Making Trouble: Essays on Gay History, Politics, and the University, Routledge: New York, 1992. “The Homosexual Menace: The Politics of Sexuality in Cold War America,” pp. 57-73. Packet

Ellen Schrecker (ed.), The Age of McCarthyism: A Brief History With Documents, Bedford/St. Martins, Boston, 2002. “To Quarantine Communism: J. Edgar Hoover Speaks to the American People,” pp. 126-133, and “’I Have in My Hand’: Senator Joseph McCarthy Charges That There Are Communists in the State Department,” 237-241. Packet

Ronald Lora, “A View from the Right: Conservative Intellectuals, the Cold War, and McCarthy,” in Robert Griffith and Athan Theoharis (eds.), The Specter: Original Essays on the Cold War and the Origins of McCarthyism, Franklin Watts Inc., 1974, pp. 42-70. Packet

Week III (April 12, 14) “An American Dilemma: The Rise of the Civil Rights Movement (I) Essay due April 14

Waldo E. Martin, Jr. (ed.), Brown v Board of Education: A Brief History with Documents, Bedford/St. Martins, Boston & New York, 1998. Packet

• “The Effects of Segregation,”- pp.142-151.
• “Appelles’ Brief, 1952”- pp. 151-155.
• Chief Justice Earl Warren, Opinion, pp. 168-174
• Popular Response to Brown, pp. 199-223.

Week IV (April 19, 21) “An American Dilemma : The Rise of the Civil Rights Movement (II)

Martin Luther King, Jr. Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story, Harper and Brothers, Publishers, New York, 1958. “Where Do We Go From Here?” pp. 189-224. Packet

James Baldwin, Collected Essays, Library Classics of US, Inc, New York, 1998. “The Dangerous Road Before Martin Luther King,” pp. 638-658. Packet

Henry Hampton and Steve Fayer, Voices of Freedom: An Oral History of the Civil Rights Movement from the 1950s Through the 1980s, New York: Bantam Books, 1990, “The Montgomery Bus Boycott, 1955-56, pp. 18-33. Packet

Week V (April 26, 28) Living with the Bomb (Film: “The Atomic Cafe”)

Paul Boyer, Fallout: A Historian Reflects on America’s Half-Century Encounter with Nuclear Weapons, Ohio State University Press, Columbus, 1998. “The American Medical Profession and the Threat of Nuclear War,” pp. 61-86. Packet

Richard Polenberg, “The Ethical Responsibilities of the Scientist: The Case of J. Robert Oppenheimer,” pp. 129-161, in William H. Chafe (ed.), The Achievement of American Liberalism, New York: Columbia University Press, 2003. Packet

Philip L. Cantelon, Richard G. Hewlett, and Robert C. Williams (eds.) The American Atom: A Documentary History of Nuclear Policies from the Discovery of Fission to the Present, University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, 1984. “The Oppenheimer Case,” pp. 139-162. Packet

Week VI (May 3, 5) The Cultural Landscape (I) Peyton Place review due May 5

Grace Metalious, Peyton Place, Northeastern University Press, Boston, 1999.

Week VII (May 10, 12) The Cultural Landscape (II)

David Halberstam, The Fifties: Villard Books, New York, 1993, 456-478. Packet

Steven F. Lawson, “Race, Rock and Roll, and the Rigged Society: The Payola Scandal and the Political Culture of the 1950s,”pp. 205-242, in William H. Chafe (ed.), The Achievement of American Liberalism, New York: Columbia University Press, 2003. Packet

Week VIII (May 17, 19) Work and Labor (I)

Jack Metzgar, Striking Steel: Solidarity Remembered, pp. 1-117.

Week IX (May 24, 26) Work and Labor (II)

Metzgar, Striking Steel, p. 117-229.

Week X (May 31, June 2) Politics: Towards the 1960s

Barry M. Goldwater, The Conscience of a Conservative (These readings will be placed in the course packet but are arriving later due to a copyright clearance issue).

Michael Harrington, The Other America: Poverty in the United States, The Macmillan Company, New York, 1962, pp. 1-18, 39-60, 121-138, 158-174.