The 1920s

Overview:

The 1920s was a decade of exciting social changes and profound cultural conflicts. For many Americans, the growth of cities, the rise of a consumer culture, and the so-called "revolution in morals and manners" represented a liberation from the restrictions of the country's Victorian past. But for many others, the United States seemed to be changing in undesirable ways. The result was a thinly veiled "cultural civil war," in which a pluralistic society clashed bitterly over such issues as foreign immigration, evolution, the Ku Klux Klan, and race.

Summary:

The 1920s was the first decade to have a nickname. It was the "Roaring 20s" or "Jazz Age," a decade of prosperity and dissipation, of jazz bands, bootleggers, raccoon coats, bathtub gin, flappers, flagpole sitters, bootleggers, and marathon dancers. It was, in the popular view, the Roaring 20s, when the younger generation rebelled against traditional taboos while their elders engaged in an orgy of speculation. But the 1920s was also a decade of bitter cultural conflicts, pitting religious liberals against fundamentalists, nativists against immigrants, and rural provincials against urban cosmopolitans. Prohibition, immigration, women's roles, race, and the Ku Klux Klan became bitter points of contention.

The 1920s was a decade of profound social changes. The most obvious signs of change were the rise of a consumer-oriented economy and of mass entertainment, which helped to bring about a "revolution in morals and manners." Sexual mores, gender roles, hair styles, and dress all changed profoundly during the 1920s. Many Americans regarded these changes as a liberation from the country's Victorian past. But for others, morals seemed to be decaying and the United States seemed to be changing in undesirable ways. The result was a thinly veiled "cultural civil war."

Our Online Textbook

The 1920s - An Overview

The Postwar Red Scare

Postwar Labor Tensions

Prohibition

Race

The Great Migration

The Ku Klux Klan

Sacco and Vanzetti

Immigration Restriction

Fundamentalism and Pentecostalism

The Scopes Trial

Leopold and Loeb

Politics During the 1920s

The Democratic Convention of 1924

The Election of 1928

Herbert Hoover

The Consumer Economy and Mass Entertainment

The Formation of Modern American Mass Culture

Low Brow and Middle Brow Culture

The Avant-Garde

The New Woman


Music Clips

Popular

Blues

Jazz


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