Depth Study - US Society Change Flashcards
What were the main changes in US society during the 1920s?
- Towns became more populated than the countryside
- Spare time and leisure was channeled into entertainment, such as cinema, creating a huge new industry
- Cinema became cheaper (even the poor could afford it) and more popular, sand the first talking movies were made in 1927
- Radios became basically accessible to everyone - middle class owned them and lower class shared them
- Jazz gained popularity with the youth
- Sport became extremely popular, and millions of Americans listend to it on he radio
- There was a divide in morals of the old and new genertion - the old did not approve of the new subjects such as sex which was taboo in their time
- Sex outside marriage became more commonnow that contraceptive advice was available
- Cars caused cities to grow outwards, people to go on holiday and also let youth ride away from the supervision of their parents
Describe population growth in towns as one of the aspects in changes in society during the 1920s
- In 1920, for the first time, more Americans lived in towns than in the countryside
- Tension built up between rural & urban USA - in the south, there ewas a rearguard action gainst ‘evil’ effects of the city
Explain why entertainment boomed during the 1920s
- Working hours fell
- Wages rose
- Spare time and leisure was channeled into entertainment, such as cinema, creating a huge new industry
Describe radios as one of the aspects in changes in society during the 1920s
- Almost everyone in the USA owned a radio
- In poorer districts where people could not afford radios, they were shared
- In poor districts of Chicago 1930, there was one radio for every 2 or 3 households
- In August 1921 there was only one licensed radio station in the US
- By the end of 1922, there were 508 of them
- By 1929 the new network NBC was making 150 million dollars per year
- Access to world, news, entertainment and music became widespread
Describe jazz as one of the aspects in changes in society during the 1920s
- The radio gave a greater access to music
- African-Americans who moved from the country to the city brought jazz with them
- New dances such as the Charleston were created along with jazz, symbolised by flappers
- The older genertions saw jazz and everything associated with it as a corrupting influence on the youth - newspapers and magazines made articles analysing the influence of jazz
Describe sport as one of the aspects in changes in society during the 1920s
- Sport boomed in popularity as it was accessibly by the radio
- Millions of Americans listened to sporting events on the radio
- National heroes united the country such as Babe Ruth (baseball player)
- Baseball and boxing were among the most popular sports
Describe cinema as one of the aspects in changes in society during the 1920s
- Hollywood started producing a large amount of films
- Stars like Charlie Chaplin emerged
- Until 1927, all movies were silent - but then the first talking movie was made
- Movies bacame a multi-billion dollar business
- Even poor peope watched movies - it was quite cheap (10-20 cents) and accessible
- Workers in Chicago spent more than half their leisure budget on movies
Describe morals as one of the aspects in changes in society during the 1920s
- Sex stopped being a taboo subject
- It became the main concern of tabloids, newspapers, and conversation
- Cinema started making movies with sex appeal - this made a lot of money
- The more conservative states imposed censorship on these
- Sex outside mariage became more common, and so did contraceptive advice
Describe the influence of the car as one of the aspects in changes in society during the 1920s
- They helped cities grow and spread out into suburbs
- They carried owners to entertainments
- They took young couples away frrom the moral gaze of their parents
- They facilitated access to hlidays, sorting events, shopping, picnics and visits of relatives
What happens in the 1920s for women?
- Women enter the workplace
- Birth rates decline
- ‘Flappers’ bacame the icon of the 1920s (but most women could not afford this lifestyle)
- Marriage became based on romantic love and children were no longer seen as workers
- Women get the right to vote
- Traditional restrictions are eased
How was life in the 1920s for the majority of women before WW1?
- They had to lead very restricted lives
- They wore restrictive clothes
- They had to behave politely
- They were expected not to were makeup
- Their relationships were strictl controlled
- They had to have a chaperone with them if they went out with a boyfriend
- They were expected not to take part in sport
- They were not expected to smoke in public
- In most states they could not vote
- They have very few paid jobs
Why did the way women were treated and expected to behave begin to change in the 1920s, and how did their lives improve?
- The impact of the war
- The vote
- The car
- New machines for domestic work
- Traditional roles of women were eased
How did the impact of the war change things for women in the 1920s?
Some women were taken in to the war indusries, giveing the experience of skilled factory work
How did the vote change things for women in the 1920s?
Women got the right to vote in all states in 1920, giving them more influence and leverage in US politics
How did the car change things for women in the 1920s?
Women shared as much as men in the liberating effects of the car. They could now go anywhere, and much further from home to visit their friends, much faster
How did new machines change things for women in the 1920s?
New machines such as fridges and vaccuum cleaners gave women more free time as they could do the household tasks faster (in theory).
Some argue because these machines were invented, expectations of cleanliness, for example, were increased, so women had to do more of the chores they used to do.
How did behaviour towards younger women change things for women in the 1920s?
Traditional roles of behaviour were eased, so they started to wear more daring clothes, smoked, drank, and kissed in public
Describe the increase in employment of women and it’s effects in the 1920s
- More women took on jobs in urban areas - particularly in the middle class
- There were 10 million women jobs in 1929, 24% more than in 1920
- Because women had money, they became a target of advertisement (even women who did not earn money got more influence on deciding what to buy for the home)
- The Women’s role triggered Ford to make their cars available in other colours than black in 1925
Describe the increase in choices women were capable of making and it’s effects in the 1920s
- Films and novels exposed women to a larger variety of role models and pushed them to challenge the traditional role of women
- This was partly because the Newspapers found that sex had a larger selling power than anything else
- Women were less likely to remain in unhappy marriages - in 1914, there were 100,000 divorcees, but in 1929, there were twice as many
Describe the limitations women faced and their effects in the 1920s
- Women were still paid less than men
- Women employment only increased maily because women were cheaper employees than men
- Women could vote, but did not have access to real political power (political parties did not want women as political candidates)
- Only a handful of women were elected in 1929
- Lower class women did not have the political power to reject the norms society had placed on them - the lifestyle of the flapper was too expensive, and poorer women worked so much they did not have time to be concerned about their rights
How did women respond to the changes concerning them in the 1920s?
- There is no evidence that women copied what they saw in love films during the 1920s
- Some women regarded the way women were portrayed in these films with opposition and outrage
- Religion, conservative spirit and old values kept women is a reasobably restricted lifestyle - their main goals were raising a family and mantaining a good home
Who was Eleanor Roosevelt and how did she influence womens rights in the 1920s?
- Born in a wealthy family in 1884
- Heavily involved in multiple organisations that supported women’s rights e.g. League of Women Voters and Women’s Trade Union League
- Their work was concentrated on uniting the New York Democrats, creating public housng for low income workers, spreading birth control information and ensuring better conditions for women workers
When was the amount of immigration the highest in the USA?
1901 to 1910
Describe the intolerance towards immigrants in the USA from in the 1920s
- The big cities of USA had established immigrant groups such as the Irish Americans, French Canadians, and German Americans seperately instead of everyone simply melting together into ‘Good Americans’
- These groups competed for the best work and housing
- The groups were very divided looked down on more recent european immigrants, even on those who came from where they came from
- Everone looked down on African Americans and Mexicans
What was the main aim of immigrants that headed to the USA in the 1920s?
Two possibilities
- They flee from persecutions and wanted to settle in the US and lead a better life
- They suffered from poverty and wanted to bring money back to their families
What was the red scare?
A fear caused by racist attitudes towards immigrants merging with the fear of communism.
Americans feared that more recent Immigrants would bring communist and anarchist ideas into the US.
What disturbances were there in American society that confirmed fears of the red scare?
- 400,000 American workers went on strike
- Police in Boston went on strike and thieves roamed the city
- There were Race Riots in 25 towns
- In april 1919 a bomb was planted in Milwaukee that killed ten people
- In may, bombs were posted to 36 prominent Americans
- In June bombs went off in seven cities, an one of them almost killed Mitchel Palmer, US Attorney General
Historians now agree the strikes were caused by economic hardship
How did American society view the strikes and riots in the 1920s?
Even though they were caused by economic hardship, public opinion believed the strikes were signs of communist interference.
Were the fears during the Red Scare justified?
Partially as there were some anarchist activities such as:
- Many immigrants have radical beliefs, and some published phamphlets saying they wanted to overthrow the government
- In april 1919 a bomb was planted in Milwaukee that killed ten people
- In may, bombs were posted to 36 prominent Americans
- In June bombs went off in seven cities, an one of them almost killed Mitchel Palmer, US Attorney General
However, there never was a red revolution in the the US
What was done as a response to the bombs that exploded in 1919?
- All those who were known to have radical political beliefs were rounded up
- J. Hoover, clerk appointed by Plamer, built up files on 60,000 suspects and from 1919-20 around 10,000 individuals were informed they would be deported from the US (and 500 were forcefully deported)
What did Palmer do when he discovered his purges and deportations of immigrants were popular?
- He tried to use the fear of revolution and the Red Scare to build up his political support and run for president
- He accused almost all minority groups of being communists (Trade unionits, African Americans, Jews, Catholics etc.)
- He predicted a red revolution woud begin in May 1920
Nothing happened :(
What were the reasons for Palmer’s downfall?
- When no red revolution occured, he lost credibility
- Newspapers made fun of him
- The Justice Demartment, who had had enough of Palmer’s actions, undermined him
- The Secretary of Labour (Louis Post) examined Palmer’s case files and found that only 556 of the thousands of his cases had any basis in fact
Describe the Sacco and Vanzetti trial
- Two Italian Americans, Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, were arrested in 1920 on the suspicion of armard robbery and murder
- They were self-confessed anarchists who wanted to dismantle the US system of government by creating social disorder
- The prosecution was only based on circumstancial evidence, fear of immigrants and racist slurs about Italian Origins
- Sacco and Vanzetti were convicted on flimsy evidence
- Six years later, 1927, they were executed
- 50 years later, they were pardoned
The Judge was prejudiced
Why did the Sacco and Vanzetti trial gain so much popularity/infamy?
- It revealed the extent to which racism was embedded in US society and became a signpost for injustice against immigrants
- The trial had become a trial against Anarchism instead of a trial about murder - this injustice enraged people
Describe the Immigration Quotas put into place in the 1920s due to fear of immigrants
- In 1924, the government introduced a quota system that limited immigration into the US
- It ensured that the largest proportions of immigrants were from North-West Europe
- From over a million immigrants per year in 1901 to 1910, the immigration rate in 1929 had fallen to 150,000
- No Asians were allowed at all
Describe the Harlem Renaissance
A period in which Harlem became a home to a literary and artistic revival that represented African-Amercian opinions and culture
What were the diferent organisations that supported African-Amercians in different ways with diferent approaches?
- In 1909, the NAACP was founded that urged African-Amercians too protest against racial violence, led by Dubois
- Marcus Garvey believed that African-Amercians should be seperate from WASPs as they were better. He even sparked violent riots. He wanted to create a better society composet of educated African-Amercians in Africa
- The last organisation had a ‘know your place attitude’ where they wanted to incease African-Amercian education but keeping them in an inferior class to increase the chance of these demands succeeding
Describe Harlem in the 1920s
- It was the largest Africn-American community
- It suffered from overcrowding, poverty, crime and unemployment
- However, it was a place where African-Amercian immigrants from the South ended up and brougt their culture with them
- This led to an artistic and literary revival
Why did the African-American conditions not improve much during the 1920s
- Conservatives such as the KKK still believed in the Jim Crow Laws
- African-American organisations were divided, they could not cooperate and demand the same thing, which weakened their stance
What led to the revival of the KKK?
In 1915, the film ‘Birth of the Nation’ was released, which promoted white (WASP) supremacy and degraded African-Americans, in addition to portraying the KKK as righteous saviours
Woodrow Wilson approved of it!
