“Young in
Syllabus
and Survival Guide
History
579 – Fall 2009
Thursday
7:00 pm – 9:45 pm, Sierra Hall 186
Instructor
Dr. Thomas W. Devine
Phone: (818) 677-3550 Email: tom.devine@csun.edu
Office Hours:
The following
books – listed in the order in which we will read them – are available at the
Matador Bookstore or, more cheaply, on line.
All other readings will be provided in class.
•
David Nasaw, Children of the City: At Work & At Play, (
• Stephen Lassonde, Learning to Forget:
Schooling and Family Life in
•
Lisa Jacobson, Raising Consumers: Children and the American Mass Market in the Early
Twentieth Century, (
•
Paula S. Fass, The Damned and
the Beautiful, (
•
Jennifer Ritterhouse, Growing Up
Jim Crow: The Racial Socialization of Black and White Southern Children, 1890-1940, (
•
Kriste Lindenmeyer, The Greatest Generation Grows Up: American Childhood in the
1930s, (Ivan R. Dee, 2005)
•
Eduardo Obregón Pagán, Murder at the Sleepy
Lagoon: Zoot Suits, Race, and Riot in Wartime
•
James Gilbert, A Cycle of Outrage:
•
Eric C. Schneider, Vampires, Dragons, and Egyptian Kings: Youth Gangs
in Postwar
•
Anne Moody, Coming
of Age in
•
Melton McLaurin, Separate Pasts: Growing Up White in the Segregated
South, (
•
Edward K. Spann, Democracy's Children: The
Young Rebels of the 1960s and the Power of Ideals, (Scholarly
Resources, 2003)
•
Peter Stearns, Anxious Parents: A
History of Modern Childrearing in
Spirit of
the Course
From Horatio Alger to Hanson, Americans have long been
obsessed with youth – heralding it, romanticizing it, protecting it, clinging
to it, and, at times, exploiting it.
Today, just as one hundred years ago, we as a nation are seemingly
preoccupied with “what is to become of the young.” Yet in our public discussions, we typically
have no historical context – no awareness that each generation before us argued
and worried over many of the same issues, often operating under the same
dubious assumptions that we continue to hold decades later. In hopes of providing some historical
context, this class will offer an overview of what it was like to be young in
To the greatest extent possible, we will approach our topic
from the perspective of the young people themselves. By looking at the experiences of various
kinds of youth – rich, poor, black, Latino, white, college bound, privileged,
and powerless – we will challenge the very concept of a singular “American
youth culture.” We will also consider
how adult-created assumptions about race, gender, ethnicity, and popular
culture played out in children’s lives.
Finally, we will examine how adults reacted to the behavior of their
children. Specifically, we will focus on
how they sought to keep the nation’s youth from being “corrupted” and how young
people responded to their efforts.
Though
such considerations will not dominate our discussions, we will also explore
some methodological questions: How does
one capture accurately the “voices” of subjects who left few written records? How does one use public records, reports, and
other primary sources created by adults to understand the experiences of young
people? How does one demonstrate and
assess connections between trends in popular culture and trends in behavior? What role does memory and the distance of
time play in distorting or clarifying historical actors’ (and our own) views on
youth?
I have made a special effort to assign readings that represent the latest
(if not always the most widely held) views on various topics, though I have also
included a few “old chestnuts” that have stood the test of time. You will notice that the readings throughout
the course come from various ideological and methodological perspectives. I encourage you to be critical of both the
readings and what I say in class when you find the arguments expressed to be
unpersuasive. (More often that not, what I’m saying is meant to provoke a
critical rejoinder and I will eagerly defend the most outrageous positions just
for the joy of playing devil’s advocate.)
Grading
Class Participation --35%
Oral Presentation/Analytical Essay --10%
Semester Project (Due
December 6) --30%
Final Essay (Due
December 13) --25%
Explanation
of Requirements
Completing the
There’s
no getting around it – this class requires a lot of reading. But, as a Masters level seminar, it is
supposed to. To succeed in this course,
you will need to complete the reading, but you will also need to have given it
some thought. Read with a pencil in hand
– take notes in the margins. Record
terms that are unfamiliar to you or that you don’t understand, points that you
find interesting or surprising, arguments with which you strongly agree or
disagree, methods of research or analysis that seem especially creative or
insightful (or misguided and silly), or ideas that connect to things we’ve
talked about in previous classes. Also,
read smart – don’t read every single word of the first 4 chapters and nothing
thereafter because you ran out of time. If you catch the argument the author is
making, don’t sweat all the details or supporting examples – skim over them and
get on to the next major point. It is
more important to have gotten the gist of an entire book than to master every
aspect of the first one-third of it.
Finally,
figure out how many pages you can read in an hour. Based on that, calculate how
many hours it will likely take you to read a 185 – or 200- or 240-page book.
This will allow you to manage your time more effectively and keep you from deluding
yourself that you can read an entire book in the few hours before class.
Participation in Discussion
This is a seminar-style course in
which active participation in the weekly discussions is crucial to the class’s
success and each individual student’s success.
Our meetings will be conversations – free, open, and informal exchanges
of ideas based on the assigned readings – and I expect everyone to take
part. I will do my best to insure each
student has ample opportunity to contribute, but, ultimately, it will be
up to you to make certain that you remain an active participant rather than a
passive observer. If you have concerns
about the quantity and quality of your participation, do come to see me during
office hours so we can discuss these concerns.
Leading Discussion
One person will be responsible for
leading the discussion each week. That
person will compose a list of 7-8 questions that address the major themes and
issues raised in the reading. Each student should meet with me briefly at some point
during the week before you lead discussion to go over your questions. (If need
be, this exchange can be done over email.) Optimally, the discussion leader
will have finished writing the questions at least 24 hours before the seminar
so I can distribute them to everyone via email attachment. If you have not led
a discussion before, I recommend setting up an appointment with me so we can go
over some strategies for leading effective discussions. Your leading of
discussion will not receive a grade per se, but will be taken into
account in the calculation of your participation grade.
Précis
One person will be responsible for
producing a single-spaced 2-page précis of the readings for each week. This assignment is meant to be a summary
rather than a review, though you may give an overall evaluation of the book in
the final paragraph. The person who
writes the précis should email it to me as an attachment at least 3 hours
before class so I can proofread it and make copies for the rest of the class.
This assignment, too, will not receive a grade per se, though in
calculating your participation grade, I will take into account the quality of
and amount of effort you appear to have put in to your précis.
Oral Presentation/Analytical Essay
Each week one person will be
responsible for completing some additional reading on our topic. Often, though
not always, this reading will present arguments or interpretations that run
counter to those in the assigned reading. At some point during class, usually
right after the break, you will have the floor to present a summary and
assessment of the supplemental reading.
As part of your presentation, you should explain how the reading you
have done relates to the common reading – how does it add to or challenge the
perspective of that week’s book? You should allow a few minutes at the end of
your presentation to field questions from the class. Do not extend your
presentation beyond 15 minutes and do not read your presentation verbatim from
a prepared text. Keep in mind that no one likes to sit through a
boring presentation or one that is disorganized because it has been thrown
together at the last moment. Out of respect for your classmates, allow yourself
enough time to prepare a polished presentation. I will evaluate your presentation
based on organization and content as well as on the quality of your
delivery. Within a week, you should
email me an essay of no more than 1500 words based on the content and analysis
of your oral presentation.
Semester Project
Select a
topic from the period covered in the course that you find to be of interest and
do some outside reading on it. Your
choice of focus need not be directly related to the material covered in the
course. Indeed, this is your opportunity
to investigate a subject area that the course may neglect. I recommend drawing on a variety of book
chapters and articles. After your
reading has made you an “expert” on the topic, summarize your findings and
offer your own insights and analysis in a double-spaced 10-12 page essay. The paper should be analytical rather than
narrative – that is, it should make an argument rather than tell a story. The more sources you incorporate, the more
thorough your essay will be. There are no hard and fast rules regarding the
number of sources, but anything under five major sources will likely produce an
inadequate paper. Also, since this is a semester
project, not a “last two weeks of the semester project,” your final product
should reflect a semester’s worth of work and will be evaluated accordingly. So as to prevent you from putting
this assignment off until the last moment (and confronting the dreaded
“incomplete”), we will approach this in a three step process. At week five, I will ask for a tentative
annotated bibliography. During weeks ten and eleven, I will hold extra office
hours so each student can meet with me to discuss his or her topic. At this
point, you should have completed nearly all of the reading for your project and
be well on your way
toward completing a first draft. I highly recommend submitting a complete draft
by the end of week 12 (two weeks before the due date). Though submitting a
draft is not required, having the chance to respond to my comments is likely to
improve the finished product.
Final Paper
In a
double-spaced 10 page paper, you
will choose a theme from the course that is of particular interest to you and
compose an essay demonstrating how various course readings address or develop
that theme. We will discuss potential themes throughout the semester, but,
ultimately, the choice of theme is yours. I recommend that you complete each
week’s reading with the final essay in mind – take notes that indicate how
different aspects of the assigned works fit into the theme you are considering
for your final essay.
Bringing Food
On one
occasion during the semester, each person will bring food for the entire class
to enjoy at the break. Optimally, your culinary contribution will be related in
some way to that week’s discussion topic. Creativity and originality are always
appreciated.
Surviving History 579…
Doing
Well
The key to success in any graduate course is time management. You should have a clear sense of how long it
will take you to complete a task and then act accordingly. You should also spend time on a task in
proportion to the significance of the task.
Don’t spend more time writing the précis than you did reading the
book. Start reading on the side for your
semester project as soon as possible – week two is not “too early.” In the
early part of the semester, set aside two hours a week devoted exclusively to
reading on your semester project topic and gradually increase that time with
each successive week. Take notes each
week specifically geared toward helping you write your final paper. If you can, start reading the next week’s
book as soon as you get back from class – if only for 30-45 minutes before
going to bed. You’ll find this preempts
procrastination (and you won’t arrive at class the next week not having read the
last 20 pages of the book!) Try to discipline yourself to devote that
occasional free half hour to reading another chapter of the book rather than
watching a Roseanne re-run on Nick at
Night.
Attendance
It is
important, and it is expected, that you attend every session and be engaged in
the discussion. Inevitably, an occasion
may arise when you are unable to attend.
Out of fairness to your classmates who do attend every week, however,
each absence past the first two will bring down your final grade. Any absences beyond four will put you in
jeopardy of failing the course. Also, given the heavy weight placed on in-class
discussion, any absence is likely to detract from your participation
grade. To make up for a missed class,
you may turn in a précis of no more than 1500 words summarizing the reading for
the class you missed.
The “Sabbatical” Option
The
occasion may arise, due to some emergency or unforeseen event, when you simply
didn’t have time during a particular week to begin, let at alone finish, the
assigned reading. If you’re managing your time well, this shouldn’t happen.
But, if it does, I will offer you a one-time use only fallback of a
“sabbatical.” Rather than skip class
because you are completely unprepared, come to class but let me know the
situation ahead of time. I will consider that week your “sabbatical.” That way you can sit and learn from what
others have to say without stressing over the fact that you’re not
participating yourself. This is not a
built in “week off” – your participation grade will suffer, but it will suffer
less if you are honest with me than if you try to “fake it” by trying to
discuss a book you’ve barely skimmed. (N.B., no matter how good you think you
are at “faking it,” your professors – just like your classmates – know what
you’re doing; we rarely say anything, but rest assured, inside we’re smiling
and rolling our eyes at you.)
Problems
I
appreciate that most CSUN graduate students are stretching themselves quite
thin, often working full time while taking classes at night. If you are feeling overwhelmed, find yourself
falling behind, or are having any problems outside of class that are adversely
affecting your performance in class, be sure to let me know. Do not wait until the end of the semester
when it will be too late. I am more than
willing to work with you to insure you “survive,” but I need to know you are
having difficulties. You will find that
as long as you keep me up to speed, I will be very sympathetic.
Discussion Topics and Assignment
1. Aug. 27 Youth
and Youthful Obsessions – An Introduction
Randolph S.
Bourne, “Youth” from the Atlantic Monthly
(1912)
Jane Addams, “The Spirit
of Youth and the City Streets” (1909)
Grace
Palladino, Teenagers, Introduction
(1996)
D. James
Romero, “Adulthood? Later, Dude!” from the Los
Angeles Times (1997)
Mike Males, “For Adults,
‘Today’s Youth’ Are Always the Worst” from the Los Angeles Times (1999)
2. Sept. 3 Neglected Waifs or Future
Entrepreneurs? – Urban Youth at the turn of the Twentieth Century
David Nasaw, Children of the City
3. Sept. 10 Turning
Up the Heat on the Melting Pot – Immigration, Assimilation, and Public
Education
Stephen Lassonde, Learning to Forget
4. Sept. 17 Youth and the Emergence of a
Consumer Society
Lisa Jacobson, Raising Consumers
5. Sept. 24 “Ain’t We Got
Fun?” – Flaming Youth in the 1920s
Paula
Fass, The Damned and the Beautiful
6. Oct. 1 Youth and the Social Construction
of Race
Jennifer Ritterhouse, Growing Up Jim Crow
7. Oct. 8 “A
New Deal for Youth” – Young People, Depression, and the State
Kriste Lindenmeyer, The Greatest Generation Grows Up
Thomas Hine, The Rise and Fall
of the American Teenager, Chapter 11
8. Oct. 15 “Wars at Home”
– Minority Youth Countercultures During the Second World War
Eduardo Obregón Pagán, Murder at
the Sleepy Lagoon
9. Oct. 22 Crisis or Panic? – The “J.D. Scare” of the 1950s
James Gilbert, A Cycle of Outrage
10. Oct. 29 NO CLASS
11. Nov. 5 Masculinity, Violence, and Class –
Eric C. Schneider, Vampires, Dragons, and Egyptian Kings
12. Nov. 12
“A Movement Led by the Young” – Southern Youth and Civil Rights
Anne Moody, Coming of Age in
Melton McLaurin, Separate Pasts
13. Nov. 19 Baby Boomers, Youthful Idealism, and the
Troubled Sixties
Edward K. Spann, Democracy’s
Children
Allen Matusow, The
Unraveling of
Chapter 10 “Rise and Fall
of the New Left”
Chapter
11 “Rise and Fall of a Counterculture”
Nov. 26 THANKSGIVING HOLIDAY
14. Dec. 3 “Sound Effects”
– Music and Youth Culture Through the 20th Century
William Howland Kenney, Chicago
Jazz: A Cultural History 1904-1930, Chapter 4
Lewis Erenberg, Swingin’ the Dream:
Big Band Culture and the Rebirth of American Culture, Chapter 2
Robert Pielke, You Say You Want a Revolution: Rock Music
and American Culture, Chapters 8-9
“Elvis and the Negation of the Fifties”
“The Beatles and the Affirmation of the
Sixties”
15. Dec. 10 “Just Checking….” – Parenting in the Twentieth Century
Peter Stearns, Anxious Parents