This series explores both the political and the social history of the 15 years immediately after World War II. America's new affluence, the demographic shift to the suburbs, and a pent-up demand for goods and housing combined to create a new consumer culture that would alter traditional American values and eventually engender the counter-culture of the 1960's. The series also will investigate the origin and progression of the Cold War, the rise and fall of McCarthyism, the burgeoning of the civil rights movement, and the inception of modern feminism.

PROGRAM TOPICS AND FILMS

Session 1: Postwar Hopes and Fears

Film: Post-war Hopes, Cold War Fears (from “A Walk Through the 20th Century with Bill Moyers”)

Session 2: Toward an Affluent Society

Film: The G.I. Bill and a segment from The Fifties (“Let’s Play House”)

Session 3: Truman and National Security

Film: Truman (from Episode III, ”Hell”)

Session 4: Eisenhower and the Cold War

Film: Eisenhower (Part Two, Statesman)

Session 5: Roots of the Counter-Culture

Film: The Fifties (Vol. 5, “The Beat”)

Session 6: Civil Rights: A Rising Wind

Film: Eyes on the Prize