Postwar Social Changes

Chapter 13

Section 1

Society and Culture

As a reaction to WWI, society and culture in the USA and elsewhere underwent rapid changes

During the 1920s, new technologies helped create a mass culture and to connect people around the world

American culture was characterized by a greater freedom and willingness to experiment

Jazz Age

Women LiberationOne symbol of this new age was jazz

Another symbol was the liberated young woman called the flapper, a woman who rejected old ways in favor of new freedoms

Labor-saving devices freed women from household chores

In this new era of emancipation, women pursued careers

Louis Armstrong

A Well Known Jazz Musician

The term flapper in the 1920s

referred to a "new breed" of young women who wore short skirts, bobbed their hair, listened to what was then considered unconventional music and flaunted their disdain for what was then considered "decent" behavior. The flappers were seen as brash in their time for wearing excessive makeup, drinking hard liquor, treating sex in a more casual manner, smoking cigarettes, driving automobiles, and otherwise flouting conventional social and sexual norms.

Prohibition

SpeakeasiesNot everyone approved of the freer lifestyle of the Jazz Age

For example, Prohibition (period of banned drinking, manufacturing, and selling of alcohol) was meant to keep people from the negative effects of drinking

Instead, it brought about organized crime and speakeasies (illegal bars where patrons had to speak [and drink] “easy” or softly to avoid being heard by the authorities)

Prohibition

Prohibition In the United States (1920–1933) was the era during which the United States Constitutionoutlawed the manufacture, transport, and sale of alcoholic beverages. The term also refers to legal prohibitions against alcohol imposed by its various states, and the surrounding social-political movementsadvocating the passage of prohibition. Selling, manufacturing, or transporting (including importing and exporting) alcohol for beverage purposes was prohibited by the Eighteenth Amendment.

Prohibition

SpeakeasyA speakeasy was an establishment that was used for selling and drinking alcoholic beverages during the period of United States history known as Prohibition (1920-1933, longer in some states), when the sale, manufacture, and transportation of alcohol was illegal. The term comes from a patron's manner of ordering alcohol without raising suspicion — a bartender would tell a patron to be quiet and "speak easy".

Literature

New literature reflected a powerful disgust with war

To some postwar writers, the way symbolized the moral breakdown of Western civilization

Other writers experimented with stream of consciousness – a writer presents a character’s random thoughts and feelings without imposing any logic or order

Some notable authors of this period include T.S. Eliot, James Joyce, and Langston Hughes

Harlem Renaissance

In the cultural movement called the Harlem Renaissance, African American artists and writers expressed pride in their culture and explored their experiences in their work (a cultural “awakening”)

Christian Fundamentalism

Christian fundamentalism support traditional Christian ideas about Jesus and believe that all of the events described in the bible are literally true

Fundamentalist preachers traveled around the USA and held spiritual revival meetings

The radio was used to spread fundamentalist teachings in the early 1900s

Some people, however, did not believe that the events in the bible are literally true

Scopes Trial

A biology teacher, John Scopes, was placed on trial for teaching evolution in his classroom instead of creationism in 1925 in violation of a Tennessee law

Scopes was found guilty in this famous trial (aka “The Scopes Monkey Trial”)

The Scopes Trial showed the strength of Christian fundamentalism sweeping across the country

The case was thus seen as both a theological (religious) contest and a trial on the veracity of modern science regarding the creation-evolution controversy

The Scopes Trial

Scientific Discoveries

New scientific discoveries challenged long-held ideas

Marie Curie and others found that atoms of certain elements spontaneously release charged particles

Albert Einstein argued that measurements of space and time are not absolute

Italian physicist Enrico Fermi discovered atomic fission

Scottish scientist Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin in 1928, a nontoxic mold that killed bacteria to treat infections and diseases

Alexander Fleming (1881-1955)

Albert Einstein

Scientific Discoveries

Sigmund Freud pioneered psychoanalysis, a method of studying how the mind works and treating mental illness

Dr. Sigmund Freud

Western Artists

In the early 1900s, many Western artists rejected traditional styles that tried to reproduce the real world

For example, Vasily Kandinsky’s work was called abstract

It was composed of only of lines, colors, and shapes—sometimes with no recognizable subject

In his own words, "Composition VII" was the

most complex piece he ever painted

(Kandinsky 1913)

Composition X. For the background of his last great

composition, painted during WWII, Kandinsky selected black,

the colour of death. (Kandinsky 1939)

Western Artists

Dada artists rejected tradition and believed that there was no sense or truth in the world

Another movement, surrealism, tried to portray the workings of the unconscious mind

In architecture, Bauhaus buildings based on form and function featured glass, steel, and concrete, but little ornamentation

Surrealism

Dada

Dada thought that reason and logic had led people into the horrors of war (World War I), so the only route to salvation was to reject logic and embrace anarchy and irrationality

If the world was so logical and rational, how can it be that the world became involved in such a destructive, terrible war?

Bauhaus Architecture

Powerpoint Questions

1. What term was given that banned the manufacture, sale, and transportation of alcohol?

2. What were women called who challenged traditional norms of behavior and sought new freedoms in society?

3. “Shhhh….don’t speak so loud in here…speak and drink softly….because you are in a ________”

4. a method of studying how the mind works and treating mental illness is called ___________.

5. Bacterial infections were reduced by the discovery of _______________.

Powerpoint Questions

6. Identify the cultural movement that expressed pride in the African-American community.

7. What did Marie Curie discover?

8. What did Dada artists reject and believe about the world?

9. How would you describe abstract art?

10. Which new popular musical style emerged in the post-World War I era?

The End