...The Civil Rights Movement was a time of social change in America. Slavery had been abolished but African Americans still lacked rights. With all the injustices a change needed to happen, and for this, many brave people were needed. Brave people who wanted change and were willing to do whatever was necessary to get it, to fight for the belief that all men were created equal and that they should be treated that way. Some of these key figures in the Civil Rights Movement were Jackie Robinson, Martin Luther King Jr., and John F. Kennedy. Jackie Robinson helped shape and influence the Civil Rights Movement. In the 1940’s, baseball was considered America’s game, and baseball was right at the heart of all Americans. Baseball at this time had an...
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...protests throughout American history. Besides the Civil War era there has not been another time in history when slavery has been such a volatile topic as it has become in the last half decade. Even in modern day America the subject of slavery evokes significant discussions and has influenced legislative decisions such as the recent removal of the Confederate flag from South Carolina’s State House grounds and other government and public locations throughout the South. This paper seeks to review the literature attaching the history of slavery and present examples of the ethnic and cultural contributions that aided in the growth and diversity of America. It will also introduce examples of today’s societal issues including educational, economic, and social variances; the right to support cultural heritage; and the significant role history plays in influencing decisions made in America today. Introduction American history is filled with heinous acts that many would like to forget happened; slavery is no exception. Although it was a necessity of the times, slavery is undoubtedly one of the most volatile topics of discussion today; not just because of the inhuman and discriminatory treatment that was inflicted on an entire race, but also because of the perceived continued existence of some of those same behaviors today. In spite of the fact that slavery ended in the late 19th century as a result of the actions of the Abolition Movement, the westward expansion of the colonies, and...
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...The Civil Rights Movement was the struggle of African-Americans in the 1950’s through the 1960’s to achieve equality between the minority and the majority in the United States. During this time, many African-Americans were restricted the rights to enact in laws such as equal opportunity in employment, housing, education, and even the right to vote. The goal that the African-Americans had hoped to achieve, was that the Jim Crow Laws would be inevitably suppressed. The Jim Crow Laws, or Black Codes, was presented to the states by government officials stating that local laws could enforce racial segregation in Southern United States. African-Americans were forced to use separate bathrooms and water fountains labeled “black”, they were told to sit in the back of the bus...
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...American to ever win this office. To many the election was a fulfillment of Dr. Martin Luther King’s dream for social and political equality for African Americans. Still others, including the newly elected President, reached back to Lincoln. President Obama would also, invoke the founding fathers, giving credit to the social experiment that democracy is and thus hinting to the efforts of Washington and others. The days that followed the Obama election would be filled with symbolism leading to the concert on the steps of the Lincoln memorial, and the day of service, called by the President, in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. the day before inauguration. The election of President Obama seemed to have brought full circle the experiment of democracy. The dreams of the founding fathers were present, the echo of Lincoln’s consequential Presidency were present, and certainly the dreams and speeches of Dr. King were front and center in this cultural moment. Yet the cultural moment represented so much more than a continuum of ideas and dreams of significant men. This moment was one of the first major societal changes in a generation. Perhaps not Ironically, the election of Barak Obama had ripple effects upon social change in the United States and what came full circle on November 4, 2008 for the African American and minority communities would begin to happen for yet another oppressed minority, in the years...
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...the human right for African Americans. In a peer article written by Joe Ciesinski, he stated that Martin Luther King Jr. contrasts light and dark metaphors in his speech” (Ciesinski, p.18). In the first paragraph, the phrase “beacon light”, is a metaphor that referred to the Emancipation Proclamation that gives hope to the Negro slaves suffering from the injustice. The joyous daybreak is another metaphor of the and end the long-term of captivity. King chose the words...
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...activist for Civil Rights, Bayard Rustin is mostly remembered for the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, which has been one of the most famous of the non-violent marches in United States history. He had used Gandhi’s tactics of non-violence by introducing it to the American civil rights movement, while at the same time, bringing Martin Luther King, Jr. to the forefront as the focal point for nonviolence and peace. Despite the achievements that Rustin had accomplished during his career as an activist, he was beaten, silenced, imprisoned, and fired from different organizations mainly because of the fact that he was a gay man living at a time that homosexuality was not only frowned upon, but also it was outlawed. In this paper, I will explain all the contributions that Bayard Rustin had made to the Civil Rights movement during the mid to late 20th century and why he is not given credit for the other activities that he was responsible for. Writers and historians such as Lawrence Freedman have stated that Bayard Rustin was content with his status as an “intellectual engineer behind the scenes” 1. In their view, Rustin was a powerful man with such a powerful political philosophy that the leadership at the time had begun to constrict him. Other historians have argued that the main reason why Rustin was written out of the history books is because he stayed true to a social agenda that had benefited all groups who were oppressed at the time that the civil rights movement had grown...
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...How far were the actions of the African Americans the main reason for the advancement of the Civil Rights in the period 1865-1980? “Power concedes nothing without demand, it never has and it never will”[1]. Said by Fredrick Douglass in 1857, an escaped slave who had bearded the brunt of the slave years. He had come to the realisation that African Americans had a fountain of “power”; however that power that they possessed would never establish anything without a “demand”. Fredrick Douglass awoke the conscious of African Americans to make them realise that wanting to be free and wanting to achieve full civil rights was not enough, neither was enduring a life under white supremacy waiting for life after death to see a new dawn .Believing and hoping was not enough. “Power concedes nothing without demand” the solution is to be willing to work hard to establish it yourself by demanding what belongs to them. However using power in order to concede civil rights was a struggle which was acknowledged by Fredrick Douglass “Without struggle there is no success”. To achieve advancement in African American Civil Rights, African Americans had to undergo a process of struggle. A rainbow is not made without rain; you can not want rain without thunder and lightening being accompanied by it. To achieve full civil rights African Americans had to pay the price along the way which was persecution, de-humanisation and scrutiny. Martin Luther King being inspired by Fredrick Douglass said “Freedom...
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...order to take part in civic life, as a future citizen. The ASEAN the Association of American Colleges and Universities states that a liberal education is that which liberates the mind from ignorance and cultivate social responsibility. Liberal education, unlike vocation is not to train, but to change people. Liberal education allows the student to learn how to think rather than what to think, to have a philosophical understanding wanting to question the reason of being and teaching. A liberal educated person is one that can think outside the box and question the norms of nature. They are free-thinkers.Failure in the closing of the American mind is the failure to have a basic principle of ideas and classic works that contributes to literature, politics etc to educate men, women and society as a whole which become familiar and encourages to seek a greater knowledge of information with the conviction that is set by our university. We no longer seek the knowledge, which aids in our continuous downfall to our liberal education. Before we get into the roaring 60s, we must first look past and analyze what impact the fifties has on American Liberal Education...
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...During his teenage years he was known as your stereotypical “troublemaker” as he continuously started fights, played pranks, vandalized school property and addressed teachers by their first names. Although he was a troublemaker, he indeed was one of the smartest students too. Abbie formerly attended Classical High School, a prestigious private high school in Worcester, until he was expelled for a paper he wrote. The paper concerned the existence of God, and Abbie took an atheist approach and explained “God could not exist, for if he did, there wouldn’t be any suffering in the world.” His teacher took this the wrong way, ripped up Abbie’s essay in his face calling him “a Communist punk”; this triggered Abbie to leap across his desk and fight he teacher ultimately resulting in expulsion from high school. In my opinion this was the starting point for his rebellious human journey, which may be considered radical by some, but for the rest his motives were what...
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...Nina Wohl Columbia University Graduate School of Arts and Sciences AHIS W4855 African American Artists in the 20th and 21st Centuries Spring 2012 Research Paper – African American Art & the Great Depression The Great Depression was the worst economic downturn of the twentieth century. The federal government took unprecedented action to provide relief, recovery and reform. No group was harder hit by the Great Depression than African Americans. The New Deal was slow to deal with the unique situation faced by African Americans. The struggles of the Great Depression laid the foundation for the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s. Art would play an important role in influencing the future. Despite its limitations, the New Deal, through the Works Progress Administration’s (WPA) Federal Arts Program (FAP), was responsible for reshaping the cultural agenda and “marked a significant turning point in the production of black culture.”1 The artists of the Great Depression built upon the work done during the Harlem Renaissance. New Deal art extended and affirmed art that translated “politics into cultural terms.”2 The FAP looked for a “new sense of authentic American culture – one that championed national values and traditions by celebrating regional and racial diversity.”3 As a result, many artists worked to place African Americans in the historical narrative of the United States while combating long held stereotypes. None were less important than Aaron Douglas...
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...“Evaluate the view that religion is an important source of moral values in contemporary societies” The debate as to whether religion is a vital source of moral values in contemporary society is continuous. Sociologists aim to know and understand exactly how and if religion plays any role in current society. This leads us to ask what exactly religion is. According to sociologists, there are three main ways of defining religion: substantive, functional and social constructionist. Max Weber (1905) describes substantive religion as a belief in a superior or supernatural power that is above nature and cannot be explained scientifically. Substantive definitions are exclusive – they draw a clear line between religious and non-religious beliefs. To be a religion, a set of beliefs must include beliefs in God or the supernatural. Functional definitions, however, are inclusive – allowing sociologists to include a wide range of beliefs and practices. Emile Durkheim (1915) defines it in terms of contribution it makes to social integration rather than specific belief in a higher being. Milton Yinger (1970) identifies functions that religion performs for individuals, such as answering ‘ultimate questions’. Whereas, the final definition is social constructionist takes an interpretivist approach focusing how religion is defined by the individual. This definition believes that it is impossible to produce a single universal definition of religion to cover all cases since in reality different individuals...
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...CHAPTER 4 The Formation of a National Government . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 CHAPTER 5 Westward Expansion and Regional Differences . . . . . . . 110 CHAPTER 6 Sectional Conflict . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128 CHAPTER 7 The Civil War and Reconstruction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140 CHAPTER 8 Growth and Transformation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154 CHAPTER 9 Discontent and Reform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188 CHAPTER 10 War, Prosperity, and Depression . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202 CHAPTER 11 The New Deal and World War I . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212 CHAPTER 12 Postwar America . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 256 CHAPTER 13 Decades of Change: 1960-1980 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 274 CHAPTER 14 The New Conservatism and a New World Order . . . . . . 304 CHAPTER 15 Bridge to the 21st Century . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 320 PICTURE PROFILES Becoming a Nation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38 Transforming a Nation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89 Monuments and Memorials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161 Turmoil and Change . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229 21st Century Nation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 293 Bibliography . . . . . . . ....
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...holiday that commemorates the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is celebrated on Sunday between March 22 and April 25. The 40 days leading up to Easter are observed as Lent. Besides the religious aspects of Easter, people also celebrate spring or the sign of the new life. Flowers are seen everywhere. There are often Easter Parades such as the one in New York City where people dress up in their new spring clothes. Children receive Easter baskets filled with candy Easter eggs, chocolate bunnies and jelly beans! The dying of egg with food color is also an Easter tradition in many American families Memorial Day Memorial Day is a legal holiday that takes place every year on the last Monday in may. Memorial Day is in honor of the nation’s armed forces who were killed defending their country in war. Memorial Day was originally called Decoration Day. It is celebrated with parades, memorial speeches and ceremonies,...
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...4 Main Idea • • • • • What is a main idea? What is a topic? How do you recognize the difference between general and specific ideas? What is a stated main idea? What is an unstated main idea? Everyday Reading Skills: Selecting a Book Copyright ©2010 by Pearson Education, Inc. 118 CHAPTER 4 Main Idea What Is a Main Idea? The main idea of a passage is the core of the material, the particular point the author is trying to convey. The main idea of a passage can be stated in one sentence that condenses specific ideas or details in the passage into a general, allinclusive statement of the author’s message. In classroom discussions, all of the following words are sometimes used to help students understand the meaning of the main idea. thesis main point central focus gist controlling idea central thought Whether you read a single paragraph, a chapter, or an entire book, many experts agree that your most important single task is to understand the main idea of what you read. Topic Main Idea Major Detail Major Detail Major Detail Minor Detail Minor Detail Minor Detail Minor Detail Minor Detail Recognize General and Specific Words The first step in determining the main idea of a selection is to look at the specific ideas presented in the sentences and try to decide on a general topic or subject under which you can group these ideas. Before tackling sentences, begin with words. Pretend that the sentence ideas in a selection have been reduced...
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...Democrat. Thereafter, he served in the U.S. Senate from 1953 until 1960. Kennedy defeated vice president and Republican candidate Richard Nixon in the 1960 U.S. presidential election. At age 43, he was the youngest to have been elected to the office,[2][a] the second-youngest president (after Theodore Roosevelt), and the first person born in the 20th century to serve as president.[3] To date, Kennedy has been the only Roman Catholic president and the only president to have won a Pulitzer Prize.[4] Events during his presidency included the Bay of Pigs Invasion, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Space Race—by initiating Project Apollo (which would culminate in the moon landing), the building of the Berlin Wall, the African-American Civil Rights Movement, and increased U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas on November 22, 1963. Lee Harvey Oswald was arrested that afternoon and charged with the crime that night. Jack Ruby shot and killed Oswald two days later, before a trial could take place. The FBI and the Warren Commission officially concluded that Oswald was the lone assassin. The United States House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) agreed with the conclusion that Oswald fired the shots which killed the president, but also concluded that Kennedy was probably assassinated as the result of a conspiracy.[5] Since the 1960s,...
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