The 1960s: Youth in Turmoil

At particular moments and for particular reasons, youth are able to come

together in a powerful way and enact change, approaching the world

differently from their elders.

Cold War Childhoods

• Nuclear fears• Cold War Rhetoric• Conformity

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKqXu-5jw60 https://archive.org/details/AreYouPo1947

The Eve Destruction, 1965

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntLsElbW9Xo

Youth

The Movements

• The Civil Rights Movement• The New Left (SDS)• Free speech / “in loco parentis”• The Vietnam War Protest Movement• Black Power• The Counterculture• The Women’s Movement

The Civil Rights Movement

• Claudette Colvin, age 15• Refused to give up her seat

on a bus, Montgomery, Alabama, 1955

Children’s Crusade, 1963

Free Speech

• The 1964 to 1965 academic year, Berkeley

• “in loco parentis”

Black Power

• "This is the twenty-seventh time I have been arrested and I ain't going to jail no more! The only way we gonna stop them white men from whuppin' us is to take over. What we gonna start sayin' now is Black Power!” ~ Stokely Carmichael, 1966

• “It is a call for black people to define their own goals, to lead their own organizations.” ~ Stokely Carmichael on Black Power

The 1968 Olympics

"If I win, I am American, not a black American. But if I did something bad, then they would say I am a Negro. We are black and we are proud of being black. Black America will understand what we did tonight.”

~ Tommie Smith

African-American Fashion and African-American Studies

PRIMARY SOURCE: PORT HURON STATEMENT

Vietnam War Protests

The Counterculture• “Sex, Drugs, and Rock’n’Roll”• “Tune in, turn on, and drop out”

Pleasant Valley Sunday, 1967The local rock group down the streetIs trying hard to learn their songSerenade the weekend squire, who just came out to mow his lawn

Another Pleasant Valley SundayCharcoal burning everywhereRows of houses that are all the sameAnd no one seems to care

See Mrs. Gray she's proud today because her roses are in bloomMr. Green he's so serene, He's got a t.v. in every room

Another Pleasant Valley SundayHere in status symbol landMothers complain about how hard life isAnd the kids just don't understand

Creature comfort goalsThey only numb my soul and make it hard for me to seeMy thoughts all seem to stray, to places far awayI need a change of scenery

Ta Ta Ta...

Another Pleasant Valley SundayCharcoal burning everywhereAnother Pleasant Valley SundayHere in status symbol land

Another Pleasant Valley Sunday…

Woodstock, by Joni Mitchel, 1969I came upon a child of GodHe was walking along the roadAnd I asked him where are you goingAnd this he told meI'm going on down to Yasgur's farmI'm going to join in a rock 'n' roll bandI'm going to camp out on the landI'm going to try an' get my soul free

We are stardustWe are goldenAnd we've got to get ourselvesBack to the garden

Then can I walk beside youI have come here to lose the smogAnd I feel to be a cog in something turningWell maybe it is just the time of yearOr maybe it's the time of manI don't know who I amBut you know life is for learning

We are stardustWe are goldenAnd we've got to get ourselvesBack to the garden

By the time we got to WoodstockWe were half a million strongAnd everywhere there was song and celebrationAnd I dreamed I saw the bombersRiding shotgun in the skyAnd they were turning into butterfliesAbove our nation

We are stardustBillion year old carbonWe are goldenCaught in the devil's bargainAnd we've got to get ourselvesback to the garden

Environmentalism

• Silent Spring, by Rachel Carson, 1962• Concerns about chemicals used in Vietnam• A desire for sustainable living• Pollution problems in the U.S.

The Women’s Movement

What happened?

Where did the energy of the 1960s go?

PRIMARY SOURCE: THE SHARON STATEMENT