History 305
Devine
Fall 2006
Final Exam Study Questions
The format of the
exam is as follows: In Section I you
will be given 10 short essay questions; you will answer 7. In Section II you
will be given 3 long essay questions; you will answer 1. All of the questions will be drawn from this
study guide. You will have as much time
as you need to complete the exam. The
exam will begin at 8pm on Monday, December 18th in Sierra Hall 279.
- In
what ways did the 1943 film Mission
to Moscow distort history? In
this distorted view of history, who were the heroes and who were the
villains?
- Who
was Joseph E. Davies? Why was he involved
in the making of Mission to Moscow? Why did he think this kind of a movie
should be made?
- What
did critics mean when they said that Mission
to Moscow contributed to a growing “moral callousness”? What did they have against the film?
- What
evidence do Koppes and Black (“Putting the Russians through the Ringer”)
cite to support their argument that Communists in Hollywood had very little to do with
encouraging the production of pro-Soviet movies during World War II?
- What
were the two major Soviet newspapers – Izvestiia
and Pravda – arguing about in
1936? What were the two opposing
arguments? Who won the argument and
why?
- What
was the purpose of the State Jazz Orchestra? Why did it fail to achieve widespread
popularity?
- Why
was jazz able to revive, if not flourish, in the USSR
during World War II? Why did it
become popular with both rural (peasant) and urban soldiers?
- Who
was Eddie Rosner and why did he become a significant force in Soviet
popular culture during World War II?
- How
does Vladimir Voinovich’s novel The
Life and Extraordinary Adventures of Private Ivan Chonkin satirize the
following aspects of Soviet life and society: a) the military b)
collective farms c) Communist principles and ideology d) Soviet political
and bureaucratic culture e) the effects of government intimidation and
terror on daily life f) the cult of Stalin
- What role did events outside of the Soviet
Union play in precipitating the repressive policies Stalin
enacted after World War II? Was
there a “sinister plot” on the part of the West to undermine the USSR with
Western popular culture?
- What domestic concerns might have led Stalin to
institute such repressive cultural policies? Why did the Soviet leadership express
such a fear and hatred of all things foreign?
- How did the attack on jazz and jazz musicians in the
late 1940s differ from the anti-jazz campaign of the mid-1930s?
- Why was it hard for Soviet composers to develop an
“authentic” style of popular music to replace jazz?
- What measures did Soviet leaders take to crack down
on jazz and other “politically incorrect” forms of popular culture? To
what extent did their efforts succeed?
- How and why did Stalin “rewrite” the history of the
Second World War after it had ended?
- Why did Soviet film production decline so precipitously
after World War II? What was
Stalin’s role in this decline? [See Peter Kenez, “Film Hunger” and “The
Nadir”]
- What were “trophy films”? Why did the regime allow
them to be shown? How did audiences respond to them?
- In looking at the post-World War II period, why does
Kenez question the “vigor and effectiveness of Soviet propaganda”? In
other words, why does he think it didn’t achieve its goals?
- How did the early Bolsheviks’ attitude toward film as
propaganda differ from the attitude of the Stalinists?
- What were some of the criticisms government officials
leveled against Soviet films? What kinds of movies were considered
“politically correct”?
- What was the “anti-cosmopolitan campaign”? Who were its targets? How did this
campaign “project” the regime’s fears and concerns?
- What were “artistic documentaries”? Were they either?
What messages did they convey?
- What were “publicistic films”? What messages did they
convey?
- How are American-Soviet encounters portrayed in
publicistic films? Why do such portrayals
seem especially odd?
- Why did “film biographies” become a popular genre
after World War II? What are the characteristics of the heroes depicted in
the film biographies?
- According to Kenez, why were the Soviet films of the
post-World War II era so terrible?
- Why did the “proletariat” raise problems for the
Bolsheviks who hope to create a “proletarian culture”? [See Kenez,
“Conclusion”]
- Why did the avant garde artists’ initially ally with
the Bolsheviks? Why did this
alliance turn sour? [See Kenez, “Conclusion”]
- According to Peter Biskind in “Pods and
Blobs,” how do corporate-liberals and conservatives differ with regard to
their attitudes toward: a) authority/state power b) science and scientists
c) the military d) the “common people”e) the nature and agenda of the
Communist enemy?
- Why does
Peter Biskind consider “Them!” a “corporate-liberal” film and “The Thing”
a “conservative” or “populist” film?
What evidence does he cite to support his argument?
- In “The Byron
of Fairmount,” Joseph Trimmer argues that James Dean’s character in Rebel Without a Cause isn’t really
a rebel, but rather an alienated youth in search of something. According to Trimmer, what is Jim Stark
looking for?
- Why was Rebel Without a Cause so popular
with teenage audiences in the 1950s?
- How do the
values of the younger and older generations contrast as they are portrayed
in Rebel Without a Cause?
- Who were the stiliagi? What made them stand out from the Soviet
status quo? What factors allowed
them to emerge in the postwar period?
- How did the stiliagi
differ from the middle-class “rebels” of the 1950s in the United States?
- Why were young people such as the stiliagi so alienated from Soviet
society? How did they express their alienation?
- What factors pushed the stiliagi toward embracing jazz? Why was jazz as a genre of music
especially appealing to those like the stiliagi
who were alienated from Stalinist values?
- How did the Komsomol deal with the problem of
juvenile delinquency during the 1960s?
In what ways did its strategy resemble earlier strategies for
dealing with “wayward youth” both in the US
and the USSR
- Why were the “jazz clubs” popular with both patrons
and the government? Why were they also a “mixed blessing”? [See Starr, p.
270]
- How did the Communist party attempt to combat the
American National Exhibition in Moscow
even before it had opened? What
negative, anti-American measures did it employ? What positive pro-Soviet measures did it
employ? How did the Communists try
to undermine the American exhibits and guides once the Exhibition had
begun?
- In the estimation of the American officials, what was
the best American exhibit at the fair?
Why? How did the Soviets
attempt to counteract it?
- Why was the American National Exhibition in Moscow a significant
event in the cold war?
- How did the Soviet citizens react to what they saw at
the Exhibition? What did they like
and dislike? What impressed
them? What disappointed them?
- Why did the older generation of Russians have a less
favorable view of Americans in 1992 than the younger generation? Why does the author think that a similar
survey taken in the early 1920s would have skewed exactly the opposite
way, meaning older people would have been more favorable?
- Why did a Soviet official describe the long wait
outside McDonalds as “a holy communion?”
- Why did many Soviet citizens uncritically embrace the
culture of the west and reject their own culture?
- What explains parents’ and self-appointed cultural
guardians’ obsession with Elvis Presley? Why did they “dread” him?
- According to Pielke, Elvis was a revolutionary. In fact, without him there would have
been no revolution – “A white man had to play the blues.” Why does he say this?
- How did Elvis Presley “negate” accepted beliefs about
race, sex, and the Protestant work ethic?
- According to Pielke, why was the assassination of
John F. Kennedy a pivotal turning point in American history?
- Pielke argues that “as individuals and [as] a group,
the Beatles reached a generation that was looking for a new set of values to
replace those found no longer meaningful.” [See page 172] How did the new set of values the
Beatles came to symbolize differ from the values of the established
order? What were the new
values? What values did the Beatles
retain from the traditional set of American values?
- The Beatles failed to overturn the prevailing
order. They and their admirers did
not accomplish a “cultural revolution.” If their values did not replace the
traditional values, why does Pielke still argue that they were a success?
- How does individuality differ from individualism?
Why did the new set of values prize the former, but not the latter?
- What specific steps did the Soviet government take to
repress (or at least contain) rock music?
To what extent did the regime succeed?
- In what ways did American popular culture during the
1980s reflect the nation’s political turn to the right? Were there trends in popular culture
that resisted the more conservative mood in the country?
- What impact did new technologies have on popular culture
during the 1980s?
- What factors explain the growing popularity of both
country music and hip-hop during the 1980s and 1990s?
- According to Richard Stites [“Greetings and
Farewell”], why has Russian popular culture remained largely unknown
outside of Russia?
- Who or what seem to be the primary targets of satire
in the film Dr. Strangelove? In what ways might one compare this film
to Voinovich’s Ivan Chonkin?