FYS The Fifties

Course Details: Meets MWF 8:30 am in Sullivan 309

Course Description
Explore the decade you only think you know. Pop-culture images of the 1950s seem conflict-free and innocent with 3D drive-in movies, classic cars with fins, poodle skirts, saddle shoes, and dancing to 45s on the jukebox. Happy families lived in suburban houses and everyone liked Ike, right? Not so fast! Explore American life and culture in the fifties through film, fiction, history and art. This course is designed to give first-year honors students an introduction to the rigors, joys, and challenges of college life and the honors program through inquiry, writing, and seminar-style discussion. Take a closer look at the fifties and discover it might have been far more troubled – and interesting – than you thought possible.

This website serves as our course hub, although some of our materials will also be on Blackboard. From this website, you can download the syllabus or access it online, stay up to date with course news and any changes, and see the guidelines for the course papers and projects. (I also taught the course in Fall 2013, and those course materials are also here, but they’re tagged “Fa13”).

Welcome to your first semester at Worcester State! If you have any questions before we meet on Wednesday, Sept 6th, feel free to email me at thangen (at) worcester.edu

Hello all – Worcester State has a delayed opening, starting classes at 10. Any classes starting before 10 are cancelled, while any starting after 10 are ON.

This means we will have class, but I would like to have a shortened class from 11-11:20.

Please bring your copy of Eisenhower’s Farewell Address, having noted the themes he discusses and relating them back to what we’ve learned in class this semester. Your course reflection papers are due.

Thanks! I will see you at 11!

A reminder – Monday’s reading is part of Dunar Chapter 8 – from p. 232-249.

And… since we’re now adding new content in the form of blog posts (please add your thoughts and comments to the posts as they show up!), I’ve copied the info for each unit into a tab on the navigation bar above: Unit 1, Unit 2 and so on. That way it won’t get displaced as easily by the high-volume posting from the class (see our first 3 posts below).

Have a good weekend!

Readings and reminders for our first unit:

Mon 9/9 Roots of Change – Before the Fifties (Dunar Ch 1)

Wed 9/11 Fair Deal and “News of the Fifties (Dunar Ch 2) – see the Newspaper tab

Fri 9/13 The Luckiest Generation (Hine, “Luckiest Generation” PDF on Blackboard)

Links from today’s class:
“Family Date” instructional film (1950)
“Two Ford Family” commercial
Betty Crocker cake mix commercial
Opening scene of “The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit” (1955) – fantastic movie, by the way
“I Love Lucy” Season 2, Episode 4 (job switching episode)

Mon 9/16 Wikipedia Workshop. Bring your laptops, and ahead of time take a look at this Wikipedia entry on the US in the 1950s

Wed 9/18 The Nostalgia Trap (Coontz, “What We Miss” PDF on Blackboard)

Fri 9/20 The Postwar War (Dunar Ch 3). H-Lab #1 on the Wikipedia entry is due in class.

Reminder to bring the Dunar book America in the Fifties to class on Friday, Sept 6th – we will be talking about events and themes in that decade. I’ll also introduce the blog post assignment. Having a laptop in class will help, if you can bring it with you.

PS: I checked around and it turns out X-Hour starts next week. So you were in the right place and time, just a week early!

Course Details: Meets MWF 10:30 am in Sullivan 120

Course Description
Explore the decade you only think you know. Pop-culture images of the 1950s seem conflict-free and innocent with 3D drive-in movies, classic cars with fins, poodle skirts, saddle shoes, and dancing to 45s on the jukebox. Happy families lived in suburban houses and everyone liked Ike, right? Not so fast! Explore American life and culture in the fifties through film, fiction, history and art. This course is designed to give first-year honors students an introduction to the rigors, joys, and challenges of college life and the honors program through inquiry, writing, and seminar-style discussion. Take a closer look at the fifties and discover it might have been far more troubled – and interesting – than you thought possible.

This website serves as our course hub, although some of our materials will also be on Blackboard. From this website, you can download the syllabus or access it online, stay up to date with course news and any changes, and see the guidelines for the course papers and projects.

This site is a blog, meaning it updates frequently and you should either bookmark it or subscribe to it using an RSS feed reader (such as Feedly). Please check it often or make sure that you subscribe to its updates to stay on top of our coursework.

Welcome to your first semester at Worcester State! If you have any questions before we meet on Wednesday, Sept 4th, feel free to email me at thangen (at) worcester.edu