1. CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN SOCIETY AND CULTURE (1945-Present)
Unit IXC
AP U.S. History

2. Fundamental Questions
How did American society change in relation to America’s superpower status?
To what extent did civil rights expand from 1950 to 2010?

3. Baby Boom (1946-1964) Causes Effects G.I. Bill Postwar recovery
Economic expansion
Effects
79 million Americans born
Marriage rates increase
“M.R.S. Degree”
Family size increase
3.77 (1957)

4. Rise of Suburbia Causes Levittown Details Effects
Postwar economic expansion
Great Migration
Levittown
Details
Single-family homes
Subdivisions and zoning
Shopping malls
Effects
Higher concentrations of upper-to-middle class whites
Urban decay

5. Second Red Scare (1947-1957) Cold War Fears McCarthyism Duck and Cover
“He May Be a Communist”
McCarthyism
Demographics:
Republican
Conservative Protestants and Catholics
Blue-collar workers
Tactics
Media and Television
Blacklisting
Reaction
Army-McCarthy Hearing (1954)
“Decency”
Edward R. Murrow of CBS
Public Outcry

6. Nifty Fifties - Homogenous Culture The American Dream
Corporate America
White-collar jobs
Business dress codes
Consumerism
Credit cards
Shopping malls and strip malls
Advertising
Brand name proliferation
Franchises

7. Nifty Fifties - Homogenous Culture Entertainment
Television
Replaced the radio as new broadcasting medium
77% of households owned a TV
Helped spread the American homogenous culture
Ozzie and Harriet
Leave it to Beaver
Father Knows Best
Movies
Cold War-themed films
The Day the Earth Stood Still
Invasion of the Body Snatchers
Music
LP records
Crooners to Rock and Roll
Literature
Paperbacks
Short stories
Realistic Modernists
The Catcher in the Rye (1951)
The Old Man and the Sea (1952)
The Crucible (1953)

8. Nifty Fifties - Homogenous Culture Women
Suburban and middle-class growth reinforced cult of domesticity
“Know your role”
The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care by Dr. Spock
Increased employment opportunities
Growing dissatisfaction concerning unequal wages

9. Nifty Fifties - Homogenous Culture Religion and Rebellion
Increased religion
Less doctrine, more faith
Fear of Communism
Evangelism
Billy Graham
Rebellion
Against conformity, consumerism, Corporate America
Juvenile delinquency
Beat Generation
Rejection of conformity and materialism
Experimentation
Beatniks

10. Civil Rights Movement Background
Postwar Reconstruction
13th Amendment
end slavery
15th Amendment
black suffrage
Freedmen’s Bureau
Ku Klux Klan and White League
Disenfranchisement
Plessy v. Ferguson
Separate, but equal
Jim Crow Laws in the South
Progressive Era Gains
Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. DuBois
NAACP and National Urban League
Great Migration
1920s Setbacks and Hope
Race riots after WWI
Lynchings
KKK returns
Marcus Garvey
Harlem Renaissance
1930s Developments
New Deal Coalition
New Deal provided some relief programs
Limited civil rights legislation

11. Civil Rights Movement Beginning of Progress (1940s)
Smith v. Allwright (1944)
Prohibit all white primaries
March on Washington Movement
A. Philip Randolph and Bayard Rustin
Jackie Robinson and Baseball (1947)
Executive Order 9981 (1948)
Desegregation of government and military

12. Civil Rights Movement Desegregation
Brown v. Board of Education (1954)
Desegregation of schools
Overrules “separate but equal”
“all deliberate speed”
White Southern Reaction
Southern Manifesto (1956)
Little Rock Nine (1957)
Eisenhower orders National Guard to escort black students to Arkansas high school
Stand at Schoolhouse Door (1963)
University of Alabama
Governor George Wallace
“Segregation Now…”

13. Civil Rights Movement Rosa Parks and Montgomery Bus Boycott
Rosa Parks (Dec. 1, 1955)
Segregation on Montgomery, AL buses
Refused to give up her seat and arrested
Montgomery Bus Boycott ( )
Supreme Court ruled bus segregation unconstitutional

14. Civil Rights Movement Martin Luther King Jr. and Passive Resistance
Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) (1957)
Church network founded by MLK to promote civil rights
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) (1960)
Sit-Ins
Lunch counters at Woolworth’s
Freedom Riders
Racially mixed bus trips through South
Encountered violent Southern reaction
Birmingham Campaign (1963)
MLK’s Letter from Birmingham Jail
March on Washington (Aug 28, 1963)
I Have a Dream
Selma March (1965)
March from Selma to Montgomery to end Southern disenfranchisement laws
Bloody Sunday (March 7)

15. Civil Rights Movement Federal Government Intervenes
Civil Rights Act of 1957
Civil Rights Commission
Strom Thurmond filibuster
Civil Rights Act of 1960
24th Amendment (1964)
Prohibited poll taxes
Civil Rights Act of 1964
Ended racial segregation in employment and public accommodations
Heart of Atlanta Motel v. United States (1964)
Voting Rights Act of 1965
Outlawed racial disenfranchisement
Thurgood Marshall on Supreme Court (1967)

16. Civil Rights Movement A Different Approach
Nation of Islam
Elijah Muhammad
Malcolm X
Originally, taught Black supremacy and separatism
Later, favored integration and Black self-determination
Black Power
Stokely Carmichael (Kwame Ture)
Black Panthers
Huey Newton and Bobby Seale
“Kill or Get Whitey!” “Burn, baby, burn!”
Public Reaction
Race riots
Backlash on Black Panthers and Nation of Islam

17. Swinging Sixties New Left
Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) (1962)
Tom Hayden
Condemned corporatism, racism, poverty, Vietnam War (“The Establishment”)
Demanded participatory democracy
Berkeley Free Speech Movement ( )
Weathermen
Violent group branched off from SDS

18. Swinging Sixties Counterculture Movement
Hippies/Flower Children
Non-violent anarchism
Rejection of materialism
Concern for the environment
Youth International Party (Yippies)
Abbie Hoffman
Radical hippies known for theatrical protests and tactics
Sexual Revolution (1960s-1980s)
Kinsey studies, novels, magazines
Contraception and premarital sex
Abortion and Roe v. Wade (1973)
Drug Use
Marijuana
LSD (acid)

19. Swinging Sixties Music as Expression
Themes
Anti-Establishment
Anti-war
Promotion of counterculture
War - Edwin Starr
Artists
Bob Dylan
Jim Morrison
Rolling Stones
The Beatles
Joan Baez
Jimi Hendrix
Woodstock (1969)
500,000 attend 3-day rock concert

20. Vietnam Protests Self-immolation was an extreme form of protest.
Here, Buddhist monk, Thich Quang Duc, before the U.S. escalation. A few Americans engaged in this extreme act of protest during Vietnam.

21. 1968 The Year of Rage Tet Offensive (Jan. 30)
Nguyen Van Lem Assassinated (Feb. 1)
My Lai Massacre (Mar. 16)
LBJ Withdraws (Mar. 31)
MLK Assassination (Apr. 4)
Columbia University Protests (Apr )
Robert Kennedy Assassination (June 5)
Democratic National Convention Riots (Aug )
Nixon wins election (Nov. 5)

22. Kent State University (1970)
Student protests of Cambodia invasion
Ohio National Guard opened fire, killing 4 students and wounding 9 students (May 4, 1970)
President Nixon responded with indifference
Majority of Americans blamed students
Emphasized turmoil in America over Vietnam and the youth-based counterculture
Mary Ann Vecchio in anguish over Jeffrey Miller
* Pulitzer Prize winning photo

23. Feminist Movement The Feminine Mystique by Betty Friedan (1963)
Inspiration for women to seek higher opportunities beyond housewives
National Organization of Women (NOW)
Activist group for equality and opportunity for women
Gloria Steinem
Equal Rights Amendment (ERA)
Congress passed equality in all aspects of society based on gender
Phyllis Schlafly inspires its defeat

24. Failure of ERA Ratification

25. Civil Rights Movement Fuels Other Minorities
Hispanics
United Farm Workers Organization
Cesar Chavez
Exploited for cheap labor, especially in agricultural sector
Boycotts in retaliation to exploitation of immigrants
Si Se Puede!
Will become second largest demographic fueled by immigration
Neo-nativism development
Natives
American Indian Movement (AIM)
Indian Self-Determination Act (1975)
Homosexuals
Gay Liberation Movement
Setbacks
Bowers v. Hardwick (1986)
Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell (1993)
Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) (1996)
Achievements
Lawrence v. Texas (2003)
Same-sex marriage*

26. Contemporary Labor Taft-Hartley Act AFL-CIO (1955) Labor weakens
United Farm Workers (UFW)
Labor weakens
PATCO Strike (1981)
NAFTA (1994)
Private-sector union membership decreased
Public-sector union organizations and membership expanded

27. The Sunbelt and Rustbelt
Why the Sunbelt?
Low taxes, warmer climates, defense industries, right-to-work, immigrants
Rustbelt
Deindustrialization due to globalization, domestic policies, demographics. migration

28. Contemporary Immigration
Pushes
Escape communist regimes or developing nations
Pulls
Seek American Dream
Immigration Demographics by 1980s
47% from Latin America
37% from Asia
12% from Europe and Canada
Immigration Policies
Immigration Act of 1965
Eliminated 1920s quota laws
Immigration Reform and Control Act (1986)
Penalties for illegal immigration employment
Illegal immigrants before 1982 granted residency
Multicultural Society

29. Health and Science Developments and Issues
Technology
Industrial Automation
Airplanes/NASA
Computers/Internet
Health
Polio vaccine
Jonas Salk (1955)
Graying of America
HIV/AIDS
Education
Research and Development
Environment
Silent Spring by Rachel Carson (1962)
Go Green