cultural literacy 27 Flashcards
“Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last?”
Joseph Welch quote uttered in Army/McCarthy hearings (Welch was the army counsel)
junket/junketeer
fact-finding mission/someone on a fact-finding mission
G. David Schine
friend and possible lover of Roy Cohn, served on Roy Cohn’s staff and became subject of investigation into possible special treatment in the Army arranged by McCarthy
chumming/chumbucket
practice of using animal offal (chum) to catch fish/container for chum
mezcal
liquor distilled from agave
tequila
liquor distilled from blue agave
5 stars in the Chinese flag
agricultural proletariat, urban proletariat, petit bourgeosie, industrialists, Communist party
Fifth Monarchists
millenarian sect and political faction during the English Civil War
Al Biruni
Persian history writer, ca. 1000 A.D.
Vestiges of Past Nations, India
two books written by Al Biruni
Great System of Astronomy
Ptolemy’s book on astronomy
“The Pseudo Conservative Revolt”
essay by Richard Hofstadter attempting to understand the type of radical conservative prevalent in the McCarthy era
die Scholle
clod, floe (Ger.)
der Bauchredner
ventriloquist (Ger.)
3 phases in critical approaches to McCarthyism
1950s: sociological; 1960s: political; present: traditionalists vs. revisionists
traditionalist view of McCarthyism
it was a genuine attempt to root out Communists
revisionist view of McCarthyism
it was just a demagogical witch hunt
Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations
the Senate subcommittee chaired by Joseph McCarthy
Haymarket Riot occasion
1886 Chicago protest for 8-hour workday
Haymarket Riot complications
original protest led to confrontation with police, both protestors and police were shot, foreigners were rounded up and sentenced with little evidence
Knights of Labor
19th century nationwide labor union in the U.S.
Combination Acts
laws passed at turn of 18th/19th century in UK forbidding workers (and nominally also businesses) from joining together for purposes of forming larger organizations
closed shop union
all workers (current and new) must be in the union
Petitioners
predecessor party of the Whigs
Abhorrers
predecessor party of the Tories
First Red Scare
crackdown on Communists and unions at the end of WWI
“The Passing of the Great Race”
racist tract by Madison Grant
uraeus
stylized cobra in Egyptian art
asp, rattlesnake
2 types of vipers
Sammarinese
demonym for San Marino
Gwen Stacy
Peter Parker’s girlfriend; also, Spider-Woman
Ramesses the Great, Ozymandias
two alternate titles of Ramesses II
“Exit Stage Left”
graphic novel which imagines Snagglepuss as a 1950s Southern playwright being investigated by the HUAC
Bone
series of graphic novels by Jeff Smith about a fantastical white creature, mixes comedy and fantasy
Clark County
county in which Las Vegas is located in Nevada
“fossil fuel gas”
nickname of CO2
Mary Ann Evans
real name of George Eliot
Middlemarch, Silas Marner
2 novels by George Eliot
“Little Match Girl”
Hans Christian Andersen tearjerker story
premise of “Little Match Girl”
poor girl selling matches has vision of dead grandmother just before she herself dies