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Big Idea Overview and ResourcesBig Idea 2: Nature and Technology Big Idea 3: Extending and Remaking Traditions Overview The mid-twentieth century was a time of social revolution. Minorities and women revolted against the laws that limited their personal and political freedoms. Anti-segregation demonstrations in the south, the women's rights movement, and the Vietnam War all occurred during this significant period in U.S. history. A blow against desegregation in schools occurred in 1954, after the U.S. Supreme Court made its landmark ruling in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. After Brown, the fight for equality for African Americans was a slow but passionate process. Martin Luther King Jr., a pastor's son from Atlanta, Georgia, helped inspire the Civil Rights Movement. He advocated using nonviolence as a way of affecting justice and change. King's efforts also were cut short when he was assassinated in 1968. Malcolm X, another powerful force during the Civil Rights Movement, was assassinated in 1965. The deaths of these two African American leaders represented the end of an era in the Civil Rights Movement. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, women began to fight for equal rights and opportunities both in and out of the home. The National Organization of Women (NOW), founded in part by Betty Friedan in 1966, pushed for equality for women in the workforce, education, and housing. Other groups were struggling for equal rights around the same time. Hispanic migrant farm workers, led by César Chavez, organized and led marches and strikes in California during the 1960s. They wanted to improve their working and housing conditions and receive equal pay. The 1960s and 1970s were known for another significant historical conflict: the war in Vietnam. When U.S. troops first were deployed to Vietnam in 1965, most people in the United States supported the war. However, the war raged on for years, and tens of thousands of U.S. soldiers were killed or wounded. The country's attitude toward the war changed, and newfound opposition spurred huge public protests. Web Resources Remembering Jim Crow Living the Legacy: The Women's Rights Movement, 1848-1998 Vietnam Online: An Online Companion to Vietnam: A Television History Alabama Moments in American History: Birmingham Demonstrations Little Rock Central High 40th Anniversary Big Idea 2: Nature and Technology Overview The twentieth century ushered in the Industrial Age and the Information Age. During both of these periods, modern conveniences that improved people's daily lives were introduced. Many of these advances, however, ended up having a negative impact on the environment. During the 1960s and 1970s, people became aware that industrial and farming practices were harming the environment. Air and water pollution became a public health threat. Pesticides such as DDT killed not only their intended target—harmful insects—but also beneficial insects and other wildlife. These issues were brought to the forefront by biologist Rachel Carson, who warned in her book Silent Spring that birds eventually would die off due to continued use of pesticides. By 1970 a grassroots movement concerned with protecting the environment had formed. Organizations such as the Sierra Club and the Audubon Society came into being, and the government established the Environmental Protection Agency. Writers concerned with the preservation of wildlife have been recording their concerns since the nineteenth century, when Henry David Thoreau wrote Walden. Contemporary writers such as Barry Lopez, who wrote Of Wolves and Men, explored the relationship between man and nature. Another American nature writer, Annie Dillard, won the Pulitzer Prize for her novel Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, in which the narrator describes her thoughts and observations about nature over the course of a year. The United States in the twentieth century also experienced a communications revolution. With the advent of telephones, radio, television, cell phones, digital recording devices, and the Internet, information from around the world can reach our fingertips and our homes in an instant. The U.S. space program also has made technological contributions in the form of satellites and telecommunications networks. Web Resources Celebrate Earth Day, April 22 The Life and Legacy of Rachel Carson Environmental Movement Timeline The Information Age: People, Information, and Technology Big Idea 3: Extending and Remaking Traditions Overview Immigrants are arriving to the United States in greater numbers than ever before. The United States over the last century has become less of a melting pot, in which cultures blend together, and more of a patchwork quilt, in which ethnic groups coexist while maintaining their cultural identities. At the start of the twentieth century, most immigrants arrived in the United States from Europe. Reforms in immigration laws resulted in a growing number of immigrants coming to the United States from Asia and Latin America. The culture of the United States has become an increasingly diverse blend of cultures. As a result, modern American literature is able to reflect a depth and range of experiences like never before. Native American, African American, Latino, and Asian American writers use their words to share their views of the world with us. Fiction, nonfiction, and poetry by these authors of many different backgrounds have gained wide popularity and diverse audiences. A literary movement is often a reaction to the one that preceded it. Modernists from the early part of the twentieth century believed that the modern world lacked humanity. Postmodernists rejected this notion, choosing to explore modern life's complexities rather than condemn them. Postmodernists created new literary categories by blending traditional forms such as fiction and nonfiction. One prominent example is Truman Capote's novel In Cold Blood a journalistic work written in a fictional context. Another new literary form that emerged during the Postmodernist period is the graphic novel. This genre uses the comic book form to address serious literary subjects. Art Spiegelman won a Pulitzer Prize in 1992 for Maus, which used comic book graphics and animal characters to tell a serious, emotional story about the Holocaust. Web Resources Immigration: Introduction American Masters: Truman Capote Author Jamaica Kincaid The Life and Works of Andy Warhol Log InThe resource you requested requires you to enter a username and password below: | ||
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