Courses

This course examines how Americans have used culture as a means to respond to, interpret, and remember acute social crises over the last century. Why do some periods of social upheaval create breaks in cultural forms and practices while others encourage an impetus to defend cultural practices, thereby facilitating the “invention of tradition”?  How are the feelings released in such moments—whether trauma, outrage, rage, insecurity, or fear—turned into cultural artifacts?  What is at stake in how they get memorialized?  To answer these questions, this course examines responses to the lynching of black Americans, the Great Depression, World War II and the black freedom struggle during the postwar period.   We will examine a wide range of individually and collectively produced artifacts about these events, including photography, plays, songs, movies, comic books, novels, government sponsored programs, and world fairs.