The New Deal's impact on different groups Flashcards
What was the New Deal’s impact on women?
Women benefited of the New Deal not because they were women but because they were human beings. The economic crisis tended to take precedence over any feminist agendas or questions of gender equality.
The impact on women was not so different from the impact on men in terms of work.
Positive impact:
- Eleanor Roosevelt: Her impact on women: Believed in women’s capabilities, and she supported women’s causes –> provided access to women who had ideas that they wanted brought to the attention of the President. It is practically impossible to imagine so much progress for women in the New Deal without Eleanor Roosevelt in the White House –> but without the support of Eleanor from Franklin this positive development would not have been possible.
Negative impact:
- Social and cultural expectations that women should not be taking jobs when there were so few job opportunities – the argument from society was that married woman had a man to support them.
What was the New Deal’s impact on African Americans?
The New Deal did not do much for African Americans, but it did more than anyone had ever done. No civil rights legislation during Roosevelts whole presidency – it was a fight that he did not dare take up. They did not benefit because they were African Americans but because they were poor.
Their level of unemployment was greater than it was for whites; loss of domestic service and farming jobs.
Even though jobs are created for blacks, they were often discriminated in terms of relief and given low-ranking positions.
The Black Vote:
- Moving north (often to upper southern states, Chicago, Detroit), growing in size, up for grabs and of increasing significance.
- Pressure on African Americans leads to political mobilization
- By 1940, 75-80 % of blacks voted for the Democrats (even though they had previously voted for republican Herbert Hoover, astonishing shift of the vote) – the New Deal can be an explanation for this
What was the New Deal’s impact on artists?
The Federal (1935), also referred to as Federal One, is the collective name for a group of projects under the Works Progress Administration. It created jobs for up to 40,000 it its prime. This project had two main principles:
1) that in time of need the artist, no less than the manual worker, is entitled to employment as an artist at the public expense
2) and that the arts, no less than business, agriculture, and labor, are and should be the immediate concern of the ideal commonwealth.
Going to the movies was the cheapest and most effective escape from the Depression. People look for something to hold onto (“who are we”) when other things go wrong. The artists aesthetically focused on realism (representation of everyday experience).
Cultural Democracy’: This phrase means three intercepting things:
1) ‘Cultural accessibility for the public’: that the public should partake in the arts first-hand, mobilizing the general public in practicing theatre (not just to watch theatre)
2) ‘social and economic integration for the artist’: that artists should be integral to American life
3) ‘the promise of a new national art’: that art should articulate the American public and artists vis-à-vis the nation’s identity, values and ways of life
