History 458
America Since 1945
Fall 2007

"National-Security Blanket"

Instructor: Steve Estes Office: Stevenson 2070D Office Hours: T & Th 2:30-3:30 steve.estes@sonoma.edu www.sonoma.edu/users/e/estess 707.664.2424 Cartoons by Herb Block in the Washington Post (1973 & '78) Library of Congress

"It Comes Out Fuzzy."

Overview:
It has been said that a study of the recent past is not history at all, but should rightly be thought of as journalism. Though historians can learn much from journalists’ succinct and powerful writing style, it behooves journalists to understand the importance of conducting in-depth research and providing context for the events they cover. This course on the United States since 1945 will use the methods of historical scholarship to investigate the recent American past and it will also engage students in an analysis of the relationship between journalism and history. We begin with the emergence of America as a super power at the end of World War II and the dawn of the Cold War in the mid-1940s. Then the course will shift from foreign policy to the home front with coverage of the great domestic revolutions of the 1950s, ‘60s, and ‘70s: suburbanization, civil rights, feminism, and gay liberation. In the wake of these social revolutions, we return to the realm of politics and foreign policy to discuss Vietnam, Watergate, the end of the Cold War, and finally the “war on terrorism.” Along the way, we’ll think about the role of historians in revising and re-writing the “first draft of history” penned by journalists.

Readings:
Douglas Coupland, Generation X
John Gaddis, The Cold War: A New History
Jack Kerouac, Dharma Bums
David Maraniss, They Marched Into Sunlight
National Commission on Terrorist Attacks, 9-11 Commission Report
Bruce Schulman, The Seventies
+ Reserve Readings

Requirements:
This course meets on Mondays and Wednesdays. Attendance is mandatory. You may miss up to four classes with no excuse necessary. After the fourth absence, your class participation grade will suffer. The midterm test and the final exam will be based on information covered in course lectures, discussions, and outside readings. There will also be five short quizzes on the outside readings factored in with the classroom participation grade. Students will write a four-page book review on one of six outside readings for the course. Finally, students will write an eight-page paper utilizing historical research and media analysis.

Grading:
All assignments will be graded on a 100-point scale. The grading breakdown will be:
Book Review 10%
Media Analysis Paper 20%
Midterm 20%
Final Exam 20%
Quizzes/Participation 30%

Assignments & Exams:
Media Analysis Paper: Over the course of the semester students will choose one of three paper topics involving research into the media coverage of a seminal event or events in recent American history. Your research will result in an eight-page paper that addresses the questions below using both primary and secondary sources. Be prepared to give a brief (5-10 minute) presentation on your research.

Topic One: Sexuality and Civil Rights. Students who pick this topic will read Renee Romano’s Race Mixing (on reserve) along with two other scholarly books and analyze media coverage of Sammy Davis Jr.’s interracial relationships (with Kim Novak and May Britt in the 1950s and early 1960s) and Loving v. Virginia (1967). You should use articles and editorials from periodicals such as Time, Life, Newsweek, The Crisis, Utne Reader, New Republic, New York Times, LA Times, the San Francisco Chronicle or other periodicals. How do timing, geographic location, authorship, and the race/ethnicity of the couples influence the stories? How did the language used to talk about interracial sexuality change between the 1950s and 1960s? Why is interracial sexuality such an emotionally charged issue in the American media and what role does it play in race relations?

Topic Two: The Post vs. the President in Watergate. Students who pick this topic will read Woodward and Bernstein’s All the President’s Men (on reserve) along with two other scholarly books and compare the story they tell about Watergate (based on their articles in the Washington Post) to coverage of the scandal as it unfolded in the New York Times, San Francisco Chronicle, Time Magazine, Newsweek, or the New Republic. You should also find two scholarly books on Watergate. What ethical dilemmas did Woodward and Bernstein face as journalists reporting on such a sensitive and secretive topic? How did newspaper editors, the White House, and Congress react to the scandal? How did public views of politicians and the media change over the course of the scandal?

Topic Three: Patriotism & the Press. Students who pick this topic will read Strobe Talbott and Nayan Chanda, eds., The Age of Terror along with two other scholarly books. They will then compare media coverage of the Pearl Harbor attack and its aftermath (1941-42) to the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon (2001). Periodicals such as Time, Newsweek, Slate.com, Wall Street Journal, San Francisco Chronicle, New York Times, or Washington Post will serve as the primary source material for this paper.What economic, diplomatic, and military forces led to these attacks? How prepared was the United States for these attacks and how did the country respond? What roles did race and religion play in American responses to these attacks? What lessons can American leaders learn from these attacks to help guide future American policies at home and abroad?

Book Review: Each student will do a four-page paper on one of the outside readings assigned to the class. You will choose which book to review on the first day of class. Papers must be typed double-spaced with 12-point font and normal margins. Essays must answer a broad question that will be given out in class two weeks before papers are due. Students will turn in papers before class on the day we discuss the outside readings.

Quizzes/Discussions: There will be several in-class discussions of the outside readings over the course of the semester. Students should have completed the assigned sections of each book before the discussion and should be prepared to contribute to a conversation about the major themes covered by the author. At the beginning of each in-class discussion, there will be a short quiz of multiple-choice questions about the book. Each quiz is worth about five percent of your final grade. The quality of discussion participation can boost students’ grades for this portion of the class by as much as an additional five percent.

Mid-Term and Final Exam: These exams are broken into two parts. The first section requires students to answer five out of seven short answer questions describing historical figures, organizations, and events covered in lectures, videos, or outside readings. The midterm covers material in the first half of the course, while the final exam focuses on the second half.

Course Schedule

Section I: From Conformity to Confrontation

Section II: From Confrontation to Conformity?