War, roar, and a little more!

Happily changed out of my 1920s attire, I am sitting in Maude's (coffee!!!!!) giggling as I look at pictures from the prohibition era (although Ms. Wright and the woman with the sniffling problem are both contributing to my giggling). How could I not laugh? Remember those scary looking women from the slide show today? Look up prohibition images. You'll laugh with me. The men in this picture, for instance, were pretty serious about their beer. They look so professional, like they were used to getting what they wanted, but they didn't get beer. And though these men would eventually get beer again, those who fought for prohibition may have felt that it backfired on them in a major way. Sure, they got alcohol outlawed, but instead of family values and pure society, they got the mob - maybe not what they were aiming for!

You see, those who supported prohibition insisted that alcohol consumption led to all sorts of evils, namely prostitution. They were pretty sure that if the country went "dry" then the youth of America would respect the traditional beliefs of their parents, practice sexual abstinence, and live all around wholesome lives. Little did the Women's Temperance Society know that Sigmund Freud was lurking in the proverbial shadows to shake loose all of those bonds. Where Darwin changed people's views on religion and God and Marx changed their views on social conscience and politics, Freud changed their views on SEX. While Freud's view on women has since been questioned and even highly criticized for limiting rather than freeing them, the "flappers"of the 1920s who cut of their hair and shortened their hems felt free indeed. They embraced the idea that sexual expression was available to women as well as men. Boy did they embrace it!

And there was Modernism in a slightly complicated nut shell: abandon tradition, mistrust institutions (like government and religion), embrace individuality, and question anything that claims to be absolute. After all, what use is black and white when gray is such a lovely shade. Sociologist Georg Simmel said, "The deepest problems of modern life derive from the claim of the individual to preserve the individuality of his existence in the face of overwhelming social forces, of historical heritage, of external culture." To put it simply, "modern" men (and women) should be primarily concerned with doing whatever the heck they wanted to do, regardless of what tradition of heritage, or culture said. Selfishness was the order of the day!

This seems an odd contrast to the fact that so many of the modernists were happily influenced by the ideas of Karl Marx who was more of a "unite and support each other" kind of guy. But their personal leanings seemed easily separable from their political ones. Perhaps so many modern writers found Marx's ideas cloying out of a general rejection of all the traditions they knew, which clearly included the political. His ideas were new and controversial and, well, that just worked. WWI proved to people all over the world that the old ways and the old government systems did not speak for the people. If the Russian Revolution of 1917 asked the question, "What will we do for change?" then Communism was the very vocal answer.

Change would come: Communism vs Fascism, 20s excess vs 30s depression, two World Wars and two others (by the 60s we engaged in Korea and Vietnam) that many fought against with fiery passion and sometimes with blood. That is only the beginning. By the time we finish looking at Modernism, we will have witnessed The Harlem Renaissance and celebration of the "black" culture juxtaposed against the rise of the KKK and the violent oppression and persecution of that same culture. We will see matriarchs of the 50s give way to bra-burning hippies in the 60s. We will see oppressed people find their voices, and together, we will discover the soundtrack to it all. Because we can't forget the music!

Three more books and countless lessons to go as we close our year with THE MODERNS!

EC: Read and take notes on pages 825-833 in the textbook. Make sure to use highlighted subtitles. :) 40 pts!!!1