Post War Part 2

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Post War Part 2

• Atomic Culture

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1949

• Russia Detonates Atomic Bomb
• Ends U.S. Nuclear Monopoly
• China Goes Communist

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1950
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Korea, 1950

• 38th Parallel
• Communist North reward for allied support during
  WWII
• Democratic South
• Intention to hold elections to reunify country
• North invades South, June 1950
• Gen. McArthur (U.N. forces)
• Pushed back North Koreans
• U.N. forces to Yalu River --- recalled to 38th

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New ConsensusFear

• 1950
• McCarthy alleges Communist in U.S. Govt.
• Korean War Begins
• Cold War
• Fear of internal subversion
• Fear of external attack
• Guilt by Association

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Subversive Films
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Youth Culture

• 1954-1955
• Rock n Roll
• Juvenile Delinquency
• Teenager

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Youth Rebellion

• Rock n Roll
• New Dating Customs
• Drive-In Theaters
• Teen Magazines
• Seventeen

• Social Order of Gangs
• Clothing / Hairstyles
• Car Culture

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• Blackboard Jungle1955
• Dismissal of Authority
• Teenage Angst
• African-American teenage leader

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Rebel Without a Cause, (1955)
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The Beats

• Literary Group
• Writers / Poets
• 1st to Protest blandness of conformity
• Rejection of middle class affluence

On the Road, 1957
Howl, 1956
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Transfer of Power, 1952
Dwight Eisenhower Ike
Harry Truman
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Coexistence

• U.S. / Soviet Union
• Each has bomb
• Stalin dead, 1953
• Extension of cultural exchanges to build peaceful
  relations
• BUT
• Soviets test ICBM

Nikita Kruschev
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October 4, 1957
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Sputnik I

• The world's first artificial satellite
• Size of Basketball
• Weight 183 pounds
• Time 98 minutes to orbit the Earth
• Ushered in
• new political / military / technological /
  scientific developments.
• Start of Space Age
• U.S.-Soviet Space Race.

National Aeronautics Space Administration,
(1958)
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1950s Image v. Reality

• Emergence of Television
• Popular perceptions of 1950s
• Reveal much about Society
• BUT leaves out A LOT!!!

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Image

• Conformity ruled the day
• White, middle Class suburbanites
• All women stay-at-home Mom
• June Cleaver
• Children Junior Members of Society

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Women

• Myth Stay-at-Home Moms
• Reality
• Women at Work to supplement income
• Keeping Up with the Jones
• Wives Holding Paid Jobs
• 1940 15
• 1950 21
• 1960 30

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