History 476

Devine

Spring 2007

Essay #1 (Option B)

This essay is due Monday April 9^th by 11:59 pm. If you did not submit an “Option A” essay, you must do this assignment. You may email your essay to me as an attachment (the preferred method), turn it in to the History Department office (Sierra Tower 610), or hand it to me in person. When you email your essay, send a “CC” copy to yourself so you will have proof of the time you sent the email if, for some reason, I do not receive it.

DIRECTIONS

· Essays must be 1500 words. If you use MS Word and you want to see how many words your essay is, pull down the “File” menu and choose “Properties,” then click on the “Statistics” tab.

· Essays should be typed and double-spaced with one inch margins all around. To set the margins with MS Word, pull down the “File” menu and choose “Page Setup…”

· Essays should have page numbers. To insert page numbers with MS Word, pull down the “Insert” menu, choose “Page Numbers,” and click “OK.”

· Make sure you are citing properly. If you are quoting directly from a source (in other words, using the author’s exact words), cite the author and page number in parentheses within the body of the text, i.e. (Nasaw, 47). All direct quotes MUST be in quotation marks and must be cited. Paraphrases or summaries of ideas drawn from the readings MUST also be cited, even if you are not quoting directly, i.e. (Nasaw, 28-32]

· Don’t forget to put your name and an appropriate title (something more telling than “Essay 1”) at the top of page 1 of the essay before you email it. (People actually forget to do this.)

· If you have any questions or are in any way unsure about what you are being asked to do, be sure to speak with me via email or in person.

THE ASSIGNMENT

Choose ONE (1) of the following questions:

1. Historians have argued that many African-American and Latino youths developed an “oppositional sub-culture” during the 1940s. What were the components of this sub-culture? What (or who) was the sub-culture opposing and why? How and in what ways did these young people employ the components of this sub-culture to express their opposition?

[HINT: This question is asking you to do three things: 1) to recount the various elements of the sub-culture, be it clothing style, behavior, attitude toward work, etc.; 2) to explain what the sub-culture was opposing and the reasons for the opposition; and 3) to explain how the elements of the sub-culture (which, in and of themselves, were not necessarily “political” in the narrow definition of the term)came together and became a means for expressing opposition.)

2. Why were so many Americans worried about juvenile delinquency in the 1950s and why did they blame what James Gilbert calls, “mass culture”? If comic books, movies, rock’n’roll, and “juvenile delinquency” itself were “scapegoats” for deeper and more complex concerns, what were adults really worried about?

[HINT: It is important to address in your answer what forms of “mass culture” were blamed and why. You should also try to specify as precisely as you can what “broader concerns” were behind the juvenile delinquency scare and in what troubling ways American culture was changing during this period.]

1. Drawing on specific evidence from course readings, explain why a “youth market” emerged in the years following World War II and make the case for whether this market was driven from the “top down” (by merchants, magazine editors, and advertisers) or from the “bottom up” (by young people themselves).

[HINT: You need not take one side or the other. In fact, a compelling essay will advance a more complicated thesis than exclusively “top down” or exclusively “bottom up.” That said, you do want to stake out a position and state that position clearly at the outset. Though the position you take is up to you, regardless of what you argue, you will need to introduce adequate evidence to support it.]