The Sixties Cultural Revolution in Britain France Italy and the United States, c.1958-c.1974. - Hardcover

Marwick, Arthur

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 019210022X ISBN 13: 9780192100221

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 1998

Synopsis

Mention of the 1960s often arouses strong emotions even in those who were already old when they began and those who were not even born when they ended. For some, it is a golden age of liberation and political progressiveness; others see it as a time when the secure framework of morality, authority and discipline disintegrated. Arthur Marwick's book is a study of social and cultural change in Europe and the United States in a period of outstanding historical significance, analyzing phenomena as diverse as the rise of youth culture, the impact of the civil rights movement, feminism, sexual permissiveness, the rise of rock music and the reassessment of traditional attitudes to class, race and the family.

About this title

Review

These days it seems obligatory to either be for or against the 1960s. Arthur Marwick, Professor of history at The Open University, is definitely for them. He likes them so much that this massive--900 close typed pages--account of the decade starts in 1958 and doesn't finish until 1974, but this unorthodox time frame, from the end of post- war austerity to the crunch of the mid-seventies oil crisis, is well chosen. It allows Marwick to place all the famous sixties incidents--the Paris riots, the Vietnam war and protest against the war, Mick Jagger being arrested, the fight for the right to abortion etc.--not only in an historical context, but also to then follow them through to their various conclusions. Marwick focuses on Britain, France, Italy and the United States and while the cultural developments remain in the memory, it was the economic progress, allied to a baby boom, that really invigorated this decade. In America the percentage of the population below the poverty line halved in the years between 1965 and 1975 while in Italy the number of families with television sets and fridges doubled over the same period. "There has been nothing quite like it", Marwick persuasively argues; "nothing would ever be the same again". --Nick Wroe

Review

"Marwick has made genuine contribution, first in affirming the reality of the cultural revolution as it manifested itself in so many spheres of life; then in showing how that revolution permeated and transformed mainstream society; and finally in putting it all in an international perspective,
exposing the differences and yet basic similarities provided by the perspective."--The Washington Post Book World
"An ambitious synthesis.... Mr. Marwick's prodigious research and encyclopedic scope will make this book a helpful and entertaining reference work for a time to come."--Washington Times
"Marwick has made genuine contribution, first in affirming the reality of the cultural revolution as it manifested itself in so many spheres of life; then in showing how that revolution permeated and transformed mainstream society; and finally in putting it all in an international perspective,
exposing the differences and yet basic similarities provided by the perspective."--The Washington Post Book World
"An ambitious synthesis.... Mr. Marwick's prodigious research and encyclopedic scope will make this book a helpful and entertaining reference work for a time to come."--Washington Times
"Marwick has made genuine contribution, first in affirming the reality of the cultural revolution as it manifested itself in so many spheres of life; then in showing how that revolution permeated and transformed mainstream society; and finally in putting it all in an international perspective, exposing the differences and yet basic similarities provided by the perspective."--The Washington Post Book World
"An ambitious synthesis.... Mr. Marwick's prodigious research and encyclopedic scope will make this book a helpful and entertaining reference work for a time to come."--Washington Times
"Marwick has made genuine contribution, first in affirming the reality of the cultural revolution as it manifested itself in so many spheres of life; then in showing how that revolution permeated and transformed mainstream society; and finally in putting it all in an international perspective, exposing the differences and yet basic similarities provided by the perspective."--The Washington Post Book World
"An ambitious synthesis.... Mr. Marwick's prodigious research and encyclopedic scope will make this book a helpful and entertaining reference work for a time to come."--Washington Times

Edition details

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 019210022X
• ISBN 13: 9780192100221
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 750