Affluence
Download as PPTX, PDF
0 likes140 views
The document discusses affluence and consumer culture in 1950s America. It describes how television shows depicted ideal suburban families, Betty Friedan launched the modern feminist movement by criticizing depictions of women, and the 1950s saw a huge expansion of the middle class and consumerism with the rise of credit cards and Disneyland. Rock and roll music fused different styles and was popularized by Elvis Presley, while movie stars like Marilyn Monroe influenced sexuality standards. Economist John Kenneth Galbraith questioned the relation between private wealth and public good.
Affluence
- 2. Affluence
- 3. Affluence
- 4. Affluence 1950s television programs such as Leave it to Beaver or Ozzie and Harriet depicted ideal suburban families with a working husband and stay at home mother.
- 5. Affluence Feminist Betty Friedan fueled controversy with her book The Feminine Mystique, which launched the modern feminist movement.
- 6. Consumer Culture The 1950s witnessed a huge expansion of the middle class and a consumer culture. Diners Club introduced the plastic credit card in 1949, just one year after the first McDonalds hamburger stand opened in California. In 1955 Disneyland opened in Anaheim, California.
- 7. Consumer Culture Televangelists such as Billy Graham and Pentecostal preacher Oral Roberts stormed the airwaves as well.
- 8. Consumer Culture The chief revolutionary was Elvis Presley, who fused black rhythm and blues with white bluegrass and country styles. This new musical style would forever be known as rock and roll.
- 9. Consumer Culture Movie stars such as Marilyn Monroe also helped to popularize new standards of sexuality. Harvard economist John Kenneth Galbraith called into question the relation between private wealth and the public good in a series of books beginning with The Affluent Society (1958).