Anti-communism Ideologies

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To what extent did anti-communism ideologies affect the daily in the US during the Cold War? The Cold War lasted from 1945 to 1953. This investigation assesses the daily life in the United States during this time frame. In order to evaluate the affect it had and its significance, the investigation evaluates the background of anti-Communism, the Red Scare and daily American life at home as well as in school. Influences of anti-communism ideologies through various types of propaganda will be discussed as well. Bishop Fulton J.Sheen’s articles of such events and television documentaries about the perspective on communism ideologies are the primary sources used to evaluate the affects. In addition, history sources dealing with propaganda in media and school life in the US will be used as well. This investigation will focus on the US daily life was affected nationwide.

Summary of Evidence:
In the late 1940s and early 1950s, anti-communist ideologies were established to “fight” communism, influencing the values of Americans. Governments and security institutions acted upon the fear that the United States was in external danger from the Soviet Communism and contributed to the process of secularization. Increasingly, societal roles and functions began to dominate in order to attain the proper functioning of American society. The main leaders of American schools, newspapers, and organizations would attempt to lead society toward the “right” capitalistic direction (Herzog, 136). Through forms of media, such as Bishop J. Sheen’s nationwide radio broadcast, popular and influential individuals brought upon perceptions that the Soviets represented the new postwar threat and a degeneration of Western society. Television was beginning to alte...

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...sm in Cold-War America. New York: Oxford University Press, 1998. Print.
Herzog, Jonathan P.. The spiritual-industrial complex: America's religious battle against communism in the early Cold War. New York: Oxford University Press, 2011. Print.
Kaledin, Eugenia. Daily life in the United States, 1940-1959: shifting worlds. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2000. Print.
Steinberg, Peter L.. The great "Red menace": United States prosecution of American Communists, 1947-1952. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1984. Print.
Wang, Jessica. American science in an age of anxiety scientists, anticommunism, and the cold war. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1999. Print.
Winsboro, Irvin D. S., and Michael Epple. "Religion, Culture, And The Cold War: Bishop Fulton J. Sheen And America's Anti-Communist Crusade Of The 1950s."Historian 71.2 (2009): 209-233. Print.

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