| United States in the 20th Century 1945 TO THE PRESENT
FINAL ESSAY (40% of course grade) For Sample Bibliography Scroll Down to the Bottom of This Page! We will discuss this assignment in class on Thursday, March 4th. You should carefully read the assignment before class so that you can get any questions you have about the assignment ironed out. If you begin work on the assignment and discover you have additional questions, please check with either me (Professor Welke) or Jason Stahl -- in person meetings are best. Why discuss it so early? It's a big paper and I'd like you to be able to begin seriously thinking about the paper, even if you wait until later in the term to get rolling on it. Due: Friday, May 14 Turn in between 8:30-10:30 a.m. 752 SSB -- No Late Papers Accepted
Additional Office Hours for Meeting to Discuss Paper Jason Stahl and I (Prof. Welke) will be holding our regular office hours for the remainder of the term. During finals week we will be available as follows: Jason Stahl: Monday, May 10th, 9-12 Prof. Welke: Tuesday, May 11th, 1-4 Assignment The multiple ways in which individuals "figure" in history provides the foundation for your final paper for the course. Over the course of this term we are talking about individuals who were critical in shaping historical events. These include, for example, Presidents Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, etc. They also include individuals who never held elective office like Martin Luther King, Jr., Betty Friedan, and Rachel Carson. We are also talking about individuals who on a smaller scale were conscious of having a place in shaping the course of history. We could include here, for example, Anne Moody and the Northern students who participated in Mississippi Freedom Summer, and activists in the antiwar movement. But equally important to our focus in the course are events and processes which fundamentally transformed Americans' daily lives without individuals necessarily thinking of themselves or their lives as caught up in or "part" of history. We could include here the millions of veterans who took advantage of the G.I. Bill, women who took "the Pill" or read Friedan's Feminine Mystique, families who turned to eating more of their meals out at restaurants, men, like David Beers' father, who found themselves caught up in the Military Industrial Complex, all those children who grew up in new suburbs built in the 1950s -- the list goes on and on. Even individuals who saw themselves as apart from, witnesses to, and for some, by-passed by history, were, themselves part of the historical narrative. We could include here the men and women who were part of Richard Nixon's "Silent Majority." Most of us live our entire lives without consciously shaping history. That does not mean though that our lives aren't themselve evidence of and part of broader historical shifts or that individual perspective on events is not important. Individuals are agents, subjects, and witnesses to historical change. Individual perspective on the past itself shapes the course of history. This course offers us the relatively unique opportunity to think about history through the eyes of people we know. This paper is intended to give you the opportunity to use the experience and perspective of individuals you know to think about the post-World War II era. Paper Guidelines 1. Your paper must draw on the following sources: (1) one or several interviews (described more fully below); (2) a historical monograph that you read in preparation for your interview or based on what you hear in your interviews (you may read and incorporate more than one if you like, but only one is required)(a great source for selecting a monograph to read is the "Recommended Reading" lists on the on-line Schedule; (3) at least one primary source (this cannot be one that we have read during the term); and (4) lecture notes and course readings. 2. Your paper does not need to "cover" the entire period we have discussed this term, but it must extend beyond a single event (e.g., the War in Southeast Asia, the women's rights movement) or a decade (e.g., the Sixties). Some of the topics you might consider include suburbanization following WWII, the Baby Boom, the Cold War, domestic anti-communism, any of the movements we have or will be discussing (Civil Rights, women's, student rights, gay/lesbian, Chicano, American Indian, environmental, consumer safety, etc.), the War in Southeast Asia, Watergate and American disillusionment, the Presidencies of Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush, or Clinton. You might want to explore whether the person(s) you are conversing with read any of the documents we are reading this term or listened to any of the speeches we are discussing, or watched events on television that we are discussing. A benchmark for evaluating whether you're on track is the following question: Does the focus of your paper show that you have been a part of this class all term (that means attending class, taking notes, doing readings) and thoughtfully engaged with key themes and issues addressed over the course of the term? 3. Your paper must have an argument. It is not sufficient to simply relate the story or narrative of your interviewee's "experience" of American history. 4. The principal primary source foundation for your paper will be an interview (or series of interviews) with one or more adults. They could include, for example, parents, grandparents, older siblings, extended family, ministers, employers, teachers, other significant adults in your lives. The main thing is that at least one of your interviewees must be in the over 40 age group! If you don't have anyone to interview, let me know and I'll help you make contacts (several of my colleagues are willing to be your interviewees!). You must interview at least one adult, but your paper may extend to interviews of several adults. For example, you might choose to interview the men or women or several generations in your family. Or, you might choose to interview your mom and dad to see how their perspective and life experiences have differed. You might decide in advance what topics you want to focus on and chose your interviewees accordingly, or you might just see what surfaces in the interviews you conduct. So, for example, you could look at the same set of events through a series of people's eyes or focus on different events or issues relying on different voices. 5. Your essay must situate the individuals you interview in historical context. This is, after all, a paper for a course and is intended to test your knowledge and understanding of the post-World War II era. The goal of using personal narratives here is to give you the opportunity to think both more personally and more broadly about this history and the nature of historical narratives. The format is not intended to get you off the hook of doing assigned readings, attending and participating in class. To do a good job on the paper, you must have a firm grasp of the "big picture" of U. S. history since 1945 that we will be covering in class. 6. Your success on this paper in no way depends on having someone to talk with who "made" history or was even conscious of having a part in history. One of the goals here is to think about what a particular set of events or period of years looks like through the eyes of those who lived in the years we're discussing. Even if none of the events we are discussing are particularly salient to the individual(s) you are talking to, that in itself is interesting. The question then becomes, why? What did seem important to these individuals both in terms of their own lives and in terms of what they saw as important in American history? Can you put their lives into perspective in the context of events or patterns we have discussed or read about this term? And, if you can't, what questions does that raise for you? Are there questions here that seem really important that we didn't address and how would you put them into the broader context of the post-World War II era? Although I assume that most of you will be interviewing people who lived in the U. S., your interview subject might be someone who has seen and experienced American history from beyond America's borders. 7. A second required source is at least one historical monograph. Why? First, reading a historical monograph (a book written about a specific topic by a historian based on archival research) is an expected part of a 3000 level history course. I am letting you make the choice of what to read, because I would like you to be able to follow your own interests. Historical monographs (along with articles, conference presentations, and the like) are how historical knowledge is constructed. In other words, reading this monograph is part of your introduction to what historians do and how history as a discipline constructs knowledge. Second, this is a survey course that, at best, can skate along the surface of 45+ years of American history in a mere 15 weeks. Reading a monograph is intended to give you a deeper understanding of at least one important question from this period of American history. The book you chose does not have to address a topic we are covering in class. If you would like recommendations on a topic(s) beyond those we have covered, just ask, I would be happy to help. Third, the writing of history is a conversation. You should think of your research as bringing you into conversation with the historical narrative presented in class and also with the argument presented in the monograph you read. Finally, the monograph you read should be an additional source of information. 8. There are also several reasons for asking you to locate and incorporate at least one primary source in your paper (beyond sources we have used in class). Primary sources are the "stuff" from which history is written. Primary sources include everything from speeches, to letters and diaries, to memoirs, to newspaper and magazine articles, to TV and radio shows, to novels and movies, to photographs, clothing, the design of furniture and houses, and more -- anything created at the time about which you are writing. Finding primary sources, learning how to "read" them and how to draw conclusions from that reading and incorporating primary sources into a historical argument are critical skills of the historians' craft. We are practicing many of these skills in the short papers you are writing this term. Deciding on the source(s) you use here is up to you; I wanted you each to be able to follow your own interests. I am happy to help; your interviews might give you ideas, as well. 9. You should feel free to talk with other students in the class (even form working groups) as you think about your paper and to consult the writing tutors. The paper itself though must be your own work. Finally, I am happy to be a resource or sounding board at any stage.
Length and Format
Getting Started Review the steps for getting started in the Guidelines for Short Papers. There are some differences here because of the interviews and requirements that you read and incorporate at least one monograph and at least one primary source, but, in the main, the suggestions there apply equally to this assignment. Sample Bibliography [Note: This is just a sample. You should use the formats suggested here for the sources that you actually use!] Secondary Sources May, Elaine Tyler. "Echoes of the Cold War: The Aftermath of September 11 at Home." In Mary L. Dudziak, ed. September 11 in History: A Watershed Moment? Duke University Press, 2003. Sugrue, Thomas J. The Origins of the Urban Crisis: Race and Inequality in Postwar Detroit (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996). Welke Lecture (1/22, 1/29, 2/10, 2/19, . . . .)[In other words, note the dates!] [Note: The book by Sugrue was my "historical monograph"; May's article we read in class; Lecture . . . well, that was class!] Primary Sources Douglas, William O. "The Black Silence of Fear." New York Times Magazine. 13 Jan. 1952. Harrington, Michael. The Other America. New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1962. Moody, Anne. Coming of Age in Mississippi. New York: Dell Publishing, 1968. Nader, Ralph. Unsafe at Any Speed: The Designed-In Dangers of the American Automobile. New York: Grossman Publishers, 1965. Nixon, Richard. "Silent Majority" Speech. Nov. 3, 1969. The Republican "Contract with America" (1994). The Southern Manifesto on Integration (1956). [Note: All of these materials are ones that we read for class. My "original" primary source for the assignment is the Harrington book. You should include basic citations like I have here for primary materials we read for class that you use in your paper. If your primary source is something like a house, just say that!] Interview(s) Mrs. Louise Young (April 22, 2004). [Note: The assignment only requires one interview, but I know many of you are doing more than that!]
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