American society has gone through several cultural changes over the recent decades. Something Wicked This Way Comes was written during a time of great social change; the author, Rad Bradbury, did a thorough job in reflecting the changing social environment of the 60s within his own characters. In 1962, the year in which Something Wicked This Way Comes was released, the youth of the United States were experiencing the Hippie movement, the adults of the 60s were dealing with the process of excepting their new found places in the world, and the society of the 60s faced an incessant issue with self acceptance. Bradbury managed to effectively interlink all of the factors mentioned above in one book. The Hippie Movement started during the 60s when the youth joined together and fought all forms of oppression including, war, poverty, and racial discrimination. The Hippie Movement encompassed a time of freedom, mystery, and adventure. Bradbury encompasses the youthful restlessness into his character Jim Nightshade. Jim Nightshade is the friend of Will Halloway; Jim spends the entire book chasing an idea that could ultimately destroy him. Much like the youth of the 60s Jim is fiercely independent and he seeks adventure, for example, in chapters eighteen through twenty Will and Jim witness an undeniable evil at the carnival that had just arrived in their quiet town. Instead of fleeing from the danger as Will suggests Jim says, “Sure, Will, go on. Mirror mazes, old teacher ladies, lost lighting-rod bags,lightning- rod sales-men disappear, snake pictures dancing, unbroken merry-go-rounds, and you want to go home”?! (Bradbury, pg 76). Jim and the rest of the youth of the 60s were more than willing to confront danger head on no matter wha... ... middle of paper ... ...)." Mortal Journey. N.p., 9 Mar. 2011. Web. 26 May 2014. Birkett, Dea. "Children of the Revolution." The Guardian. Guardian News and Media, 17 Jan. 2001. Web. 26 May 2014. "Introduction." That Crazy, Crazy World. N.p., Sept. 2003. Web. 26 May 2014. American Society of Plastic Surgeons. "14.6 Million Cosmetic Plastic Surgery Procedures Performed in 2012." 14.6 Million Cosmetic Plastic Surgery Procedures Performed in 2012. American Society of Plastic Surgeons, 2014. Web. 26 May 2014. Kindig, Jessie. "Vietnam War: Draft Resistance." Vietnam: Draft Resistance. University of Washington, 2009. Web. 26 May 2014. Valencia, and Willingboro. "An Age of Transformation." The Economist. The Economist Newspaper, 31 May 2008. Web. 26 May 2014. Libaw, Oliver. "Hippie Culture Just Keeps Truckin' On." ABC News. ABC News Network, 23 May 2014. Web. 26 May 2014.
In this paper, I want to share the history of Haight Ashbury, and its transition from a small town with nice Victorian homes, to its deterioration in the 1960’s. The importance of a farm in Woodstock, to the Cultural Revolution and how it all spread from there including the role of radio and television in spreading the news of the hippie movement and how an attempt to free culture from its moral ideals and standards only led it with no standards or moral compass, and all they were left with was thought to be an idea of the Summer of Love.
"Draft Riots." Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6Th Edition (2013): 1. Academic Search Premier. Web. 1 May 2014.
American society and culture experienced an awakening during the 1960s as a result of the diverse civil rights, economic, and political issues it was faced with. At the center of this revolution was the American hippie, the most peculiar and highly influential figure of the time period. Hippies were vital to the American counterculture, fueling a movement to expand awareness and stretch accepted values. The hippies’ solutions to the problems of institutionalized American society were to either participate in mass protests with their alternative lifestyles and radical beliefs or drop out of society completely. The government and the older generations could not understand their way of life.
Joyce, Appleby, et al. "The American Revolution." The American Vision. New York: McGraw Hill Glencoe, 2005. 114-126. Print.
Many people in the 1960s and early 1970s did not understand why the United States was involved in the Vietnam War. Therefore, they had no desire to be a part of it. The Selective Service System, which was used to conduct the draft, had aspirations of directing people into areas where they were most needed during wartime. However, people took advantage of the draft system’s deferment policies to avoid going to war. Others refused induction or simply did not register. There were also people who left the country to escape the draft. The Vietnam War proved to be an event that many Americans did not agree with, and as a result, citizens took action to elude the draft entirely or to beat the draft system.
Following the great depression, a period of great prosperity overcame America. However, as a side result of this prosperity, many of the ideas expressed by writes of the 1940’s regarding the counter-culture began to die down. In their wake, the traditional ideas of conformity and support of capitalism increased. However, over the course of the documentary “Woodstock”, American ideas on love, profanity, and war are questioned by the Hippie counter-cultural
“Military Draft: Potential Impacts and Other Issues.” U.S. Government Accountability Office. GAO.gov. March 10, 1988. n. pag. Web. 1 April 2014.
Kennedy, C. Robert. “How To Escape The Draft.” New York Times: On This Day. accessed September 12, 2013. http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/harp/0801.html.
together. While this may seem like a paradox, it is proved time and again throughout the
Hatch, Bill. “In Praise of Hippies and the Counter-Culture.” CounterPunch.org. Web. Weekend Edition, April 12 – 14, 2008. 2013.
Guttmann, Allen. "Protest against the War in Vietnam." The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 382.1 (1969): 56-63. Print.
The Radical Reader: A Documentary History of the American Radical Tradition, ed. Timothy Patrick McCarthy and John McMillian (New York: The New Press, 2011), 584.
‘Unlike the hippies of previous generations, today’s hippies know that in order to live the lifestyle they must find the means to do so’ (Lia Armstrong, 2014).
The purpose of this paper is to describe how an underground youth culture emerged into a social “hippie “movement and what led them to Haight-Ashbury, the Summer of Love in San Francisco and the aftermath in 1967. The Summer of Love was a social movement that consisted of a wide range of ages from teenagers to college students even middle-class vacationers, inspired by The Beats, who gathered in Haight-Ashbury in 1967 that rejected the conformist values of Cold War America. The main event was held in the Haight-Ashbury section of San Francisco, where rent was low, Victorian homes and little trendy shops those who flocked here wanted to amongst their peers. Many just wanted to make peace with the world, but ended in October 1967, The Death of a Hippie, when the town became over populated with homeless runaways, the shops closing down and the overuse of drugs no one wanted to be there anymore. “According to Steve Watson, the Beatniks had a certain stereotypical look that you could tell belongs to the counterculture.
Barringer, Mark, Tom Wells. “The Anti-War Movement in the United States.” www.english.illinois.edu. Oxford UP. 1999. Web. 14 Nov. 2013.