Ideas and Images in American Culture (2)
Professor Wendy Kozol
University of Maryland
Course Description
AMST 100 is designed to introduce you to some of the major themes and ideas in American Culture, as well as familiarize you with some of the methods ans materials that are used in interdisciplinary study of American society. This section of AMST 100 will focus on the period from 1945 to the present. We will first explore the concept of the American Dream as it developed historically in post-war middle-class society, considering the social, political, and economic determinants of this cultural ideal. Since many other social groups were left out of this ideal, in order to understand the diversity of the American experience we will then study Americans excluded from this ideal. We will approach this broad topic by looking at several social movements in which Americans outside of dominant society struggled to achieve the promises embodied in American ideals. We will explore both the American Dream and these social protest movements using a variety of historical, economic, political and cultural approaches. Notably we will examine cultural atrifacts, such as books and films, which represented these social events in order to understand the relationships between American culture and historical change. The goal of this course is to develop analytical tools for assessing how culture shapes our perceptions about different American peoples and historical events. The perspective taken here is that cultural artifacts, including news media, are not transparent reflections of reality but construct specific portraits of American society. Therefore, we will analyze who is depicted, how they are depicted and the purposes of those depictions. We will pay particular attention to continuities and changes in representations of race, class, and gender.
Required Readings
- Dolores Hayden, Redesigning the American Dream
- William Chafe and Harvard Sitkoff, A History of Our Time
- Alice Walker, Meridan
- Leslie Marmon Silko, Ceremony
Course Requirements
An important part of the class will be class discussions. Be sure to complete readings before the day they are assigned. Attendance is mandatory and you will be graded on class participation.
Written Assignments:
- 1-page Response Papers: you will write several one-page analyses of reading assignments. Topics and due dates will be discussed in class.
- Paper#1: write a 3-4 page paper on either Meridian or Ceremony.
- Paper#2: write a 6-8 page paper analyzing a cultural artifact such as a book, movie, or television show, using the methods learned in class.
- Comprehensive Final Exam
Grading Policy:
- Attendance, class participation and reading analyses.......15%
- Paper #1.......................................................................20%
- Paper #2.......................................................................30%
- Final Exam....................................................................35%
Course Schedule
- 9.5. Introduction
- 9.7. Discussion of Key Terms
- UNIT ONE: Postwar America and the Dream Of Consensus
- 9.10 Background: World War II and its effects on American society
Reading: Hayden 3-16 - 9.12-9.17 Postwar society: economic boom, suburbanization and consensus ideology
Reading: C&S 81-102; Hayden 17-59 - 9.19-10.1 Cold War Politics and Culture
Reading: C&S 3-79; Hayden 63-143 - 9.21. THE RED NIGHTMARE
- UNIT TWO: Social Protest in the 1960s
- 10.3-10.15 Civil Rights and the Challenge to Consensus
Readings: C&S 147-204; 216-227 - 10.5 EYES ON THE PRIZE
- 10.17 Discussion: Meridian Papers due
- 10.19 Discussion: Meridian
- 10.22-10.31 Vietnam, Social Protest and the Counterculture
Reading: C&S 239-350 - 11.5-11.7 Women's Movement
Readings: C&S 205-215, 228-238: Hayden 145-232 - 11.9 Discussion: Silko, Ceremony Papers due
- 11.12 Discussion: Silko, Ceremony
- UNIT THREE: Postvietnam America
- 11.14- 11.19 Political and economic crises in the 1970s
Reading: C&S 351-383 - 11.21 Vietnam Memorial: Representing History
- 11.23 Thanksgiving Break
- 11.26- 11.28 Reagan and the Response of the New Right
Reading: C&S 384-399 - 11.30 Papers due
- 12.3-12.5: Rambo
- 12.7 Discussion
- 12.10-12.12 1980s and 1990s
Reading C&S 401-446 - 12.14 Muliticulturalism vs. The Great Books Debate
Reading: selection from Allan Bloom, Closing of the American Mind - 12.19 Final Exam