WORLD WAR II AND THE COLD WAR

COLD WAR AND CONFORMITY1945-60

COLD WAR AND CONFORMITY1945-60

PART IIIEUGENIA LANGANMATER ACADEMY CHARTER HIGH SCHOOLHIALEAH GARDENS, FLORIDA11950S ARTS: THE RISE OF TEENAGE CULTURE (DUE TO MIDDLE-CLASS PROSPERITY AND BABY BOOM)

AND TRUE NON-CONFORMISTS IN THE 1950S2TEENAGE CULTURE: MUSIC AND MOVIES MADE FOR TEEN AUDIENCE (A FIRST)

OSTENSIBLY REBELLIOUS - BUT MOST WHITE TEENAGERS LISTENED TO THE SAME MUSIC (WHITE IMITATIONS OF BLACK MUSIC), WATCHED THE SAME MOVIES, WORE THE SAME CLOTHES

"LITTLE RICHARD" PENNIMAN"GOOD GOLLY MISS MOLLY"BILL HALEY AND THE COMETS"ROCK AROUND THE CLOCK"

ELVIS PRESLEY"HOUND DOG"

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TEEN FILMS: 1955

4NON-CONFORMISTS AND COUNTER-CULTURE5

VISUAL ARTS: JACKSON POLLACK: ABSTRACT EXPRESSIONISM6 THE 1950s: A TIME OF PROSPERITY AND PARANOIA, CONFORMITY AND CONSPICUOUS CONSUMPTION, OF UNDECLARED WAR AND GOVERNMENT DECEIT

"COUNTER-CULTURE" THE REACTION

PHASE 1: THE BEATS: NEO-ROMANTIC LITERARY MOVEMENT ORIGINATING AT COLUMBIA (INCLUDED VETS ON GI BILL)

REJECTED CONFORMITY, MATERIALISM, INTEREST IN EASTERN RELIGIONS AND ON MAKING LITERATURE THAT SOUNDED LIKE JAZZ

(EVERYTHING ON THE FOLLOWING SLIDES IS MUST-READ GREAT AMERICAN LITERATURE

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"The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn, like fabulous yellow Roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars, and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everyone goes Awww!1957 8"America is not so much a nightmare as a non-dream. The American non-dream is precisely a move to wipe the dream out of existence. The dream is a spontaneous happening and therefore dangerous to a control system set up by the non-dreamers."

"A functioning police state needs no police. "

WILLIAM S. BURROUGHS, NAKED LUNCH, 19599ALLEN GINSBURG, "HOWL," 1955

"I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,

dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,

angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,

who poverty and tatters and hollow-eyed and high sat up smoking in the supernatural darkness of cold-water flats floating across the tops of cities contemplating jazz. . ."10

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GINSBERG WAS INSPIRED BY WALT WHITMAN. THIS IS WHITMAN'S "AMERICA" (1888, RECORDED 1889 BY THOMAS EDISON)

"Centre of equal daughters, equal sons, All, all alike endear'd, grown, ungrown, young or old, Strong, ample, fair, enduring, capable, rich, Perennial with the Earth, with Freedom, Law and Love, A grand, sane, towering, seated Mother, Chair'd in the adamant of Time".

12COMPARE IT TO ALLEN GINSBERG'S "AMERICA," 1956

HAL CHASE, KEROUAC, GINSBERG AND BURROUGHS AT COLUMBIA, 194413

NOT A BEAT, BUT ANOTHER WWII VET DISAFFECTED WITH AMERICAN POST-WAR CONFORMITY AND MATERIALISM 1951THE ODYSSEY AND OBSERVATIONS OF DISAFFECTED TEENAGER HOLDEN CAULFIELD: "I'M ALWAYS SAYING 'GLAD TO'VE MET YOU' TO SOMEBODY I'M NOT GLAD AT ALL I MET. IF YOU WANT TO STAY ALIVE, YOU HAVE TO SAY THAT STUFF, THOUGH." 14