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.

 

  1. 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?
  2. 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?
  3. What did critics mean when they said that Mission to Moscow contributed to a growing “moral callousness”?  What did they have against the film?
  4. 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?
  5. 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?
  6. What was the purpose of the State Jazz Orchestra?  Why did it fail to achieve widespread popularity?
  7. 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?
  8. Who was Eddie Rosner and why did he become a significant force in Soviet popular culture during World War II?
  9. 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
  10. 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?
  11. 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?
  12. How did the attack on jazz and jazz musicians in the late 1940s differ from the anti-jazz campaign of the mid-1930s?
  13. Why was it hard for Soviet composers to develop an “authentic” style of popular music to replace jazz?
  14. 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?
  15. How and why did Stalin “rewrite” the history of the Second World War after it had ended?
  16. 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”]
  17. What were “trophy films”? Why did the regime allow them to be shown? How did audiences respond to them?
  18. 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? 
  19. How did the early Bolsheviks’ attitude toward film as propaganda differ from the attitude of the Stalinists?
  20. What were some of the criticisms government officials leveled against Soviet films? What kinds of movies were considered “politically correct”?
  21. What was the “anti-cosmopolitan campaign”?  Who were its targets? How did this campaign “project” the regime’s fears and concerns?
  22. What were “artistic documentaries”? Were they either? What messages did they convey?
  23. What were “publicistic films”? What messages did they convey?
  24. How are American-Soviet encounters portrayed in publicistic films?  Why do such portrayals seem especially odd?
  25. Why did “film biographies” become a popular genre after World War II? What are the characteristics of the heroes depicted in the film biographies?
  26. According to Kenez, why were the Soviet films of the post-World War II era so terrible?
  27. Why did the “proletariat” raise problems for the Bolsheviks who hope to create a “proletarian culture”? [See Kenez, “Conclusion”]
  28. Why did the avant garde artists’ initially ally with the Bolsheviks?  Why did this alliance turn sour? [See Kenez, “Conclusion”]
  29. 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?
  30. 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?
  31. 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?
  32. Why was Rebel Without a Cause so popular with teenage audiences in the 1950s?
  33. How do the values of the younger and older generations contrast as they are portrayed in Rebel Without a Cause?
  34. Who were the stiliagi?  What made them stand out from the Soviet status quo?  What factors allowed them to emerge in the postwar period?
  35. How did the stiliagi differ from the middle-class “rebels” of the 1950s in the United States?
  36. Why were young people such as the stiliagi so alienated from Soviet society? How did they express their alienation?
  37. 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?
  38. 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
  39. Why were the “jazz clubs” popular with both patrons and the government? Why were they also a “mixed blessing”? [See Starr, p. 270]
  40. 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?
  41. 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?
  42. Why was the American National Exhibition in Moscow a significant event in the cold war?
  43. 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?
  44. 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? 
  45. Why did a Soviet official describe the long wait outside McDonalds as “a holy communion?”
  46. Why did many Soviet citizens uncritically embrace the culture of the west and reject their own culture?
  47. What explains parents’ and self-appointed cultural guardians’ obsession with Elvis Presley? Why did they “dread” him?
  48. 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?
  49. How did Elvis Presley “negate” accepted beliefs about race, sex, and the Protestant work ethic?
  50. According to Pielke, why was the assassination of John F. Kennedy a pivotal turning point in American history?
  51. 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?
  52. 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?
  53. How does individuality differ from individualism? Why did the new set of values prize the former, but not the latter?
  54. What specific steps did the Soviet government take to repress (or at least contain) rock music?  To what extent did the regime succeed?
  55. 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?
  56. What impact did new technologies have on popular culture during the 1980s?
  57. What factors explain the growing popularity of both country music and hip-hop during the 1980s and 1990s?
  58. According to Richard Stites [“Greetings and Farewell”], why has Russian popular culture remained largely unknown outside of Russia?
  59. 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?