Global InformationCounterculture of the 1960s information
 The peace sign (or peace symbol), designed and first used in the UK by the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, later became associated with elements of the 1960s counterculture.[1][2] | |
| Date | Early 1960s to early 1970s |
|---|---|
| Location | Worldwide |
| Outcome | Cultural movements British Invasion Hippie movement (Hippie trail) Back-to-the-land movement (Communes) Sexual revolution Swinging Sixties (Swinging London) Rise of the music festival New Age New Wave movements Progg Protest movements Protests of 1968 Anti-nuclear movement Civil rights movement (Anti-racism) Northern Ireland Civil Rights Movement Black Power movement Chicano Movement American Indian Movement (Indigenous rights) Māori protest movement (Māori renaissance) Asian American movement Nuyorican Movement Free Speech Movement Gay liberation Opposition to United States involvement in the Vietnam War Second-wave feminism New Left (Japan), (West Germany) Environmentalism |
The counterculture of the 1960s was an anti-establishment cultural phenomenon and political movement that developed in the Western world during the mid-20th century.[3] It began in the early 1960s,[4] and continued through the early 1970s.[5] It is often synonymous with cultural liberalism and with the various social changes of the decade. The effects of the movement[5] have been ongoing to the present day. The aggregate movement gained momentum as the civil rights movement in the United States had made significant progress, such as the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and with the intensification of the Vietnam War that same year, it became revolutionary to some.[6][7][8] As the movement progressed, widespread social tensions also developed concerning other issues, and tended to flow along generational lines regarding respect for the individual, human sexuality, women's rights, traditional modes of authority, rights of people of color, end of racial segregation, experimentation with psychoactive drugs, and differing interpretations of the American Dream. Many key movements related to these issues were born or advanced within the counterculture of the 1960s.[9]
As the era unfolded, what emerged were new cultural forms and a dynamic subculture that celebrated experimentation, individuality,[10] modern incarnations of Bohemianism, and the rise of the hippie and other alternative lifestyles. This embrace of experimentation is particularly notable in the works of popular musical acts such as the Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison, Janis Joplin and Bob Dylan, as well as of New Hollywood, French New Wave, and Japanese New Wave filmmakers, whose works became far less restricted by censorship. Within and across many disciplines, many other creative artists, authors, and thinkers helped define the counterculture movement. Everyday fashion experienced a decline of the suit and especially of the wearing of hats; other changes included the normalisation of long hair worn down for women (as well as many men at the time),[11] the popularization of traditional African, Indian and Middle Eastern styles of dress (including the wearing of natural hair for those of African descent), the invention and popularization of the miniskirt which raised hemlines above the knees, as well as the development of distinguished, youth-led fashion subcultures. Styles based around jeans, for both men and women, became an important fashion movement that has continued up to the present day.
Several factors distinguished the counterculture of the 1960s from anti-authoritarian movements of previous eras. The post-World War II baby boom[12][13] generated an unprecedented number of potentially disaffected youth as prospective participants in a rethinking of the direction of the United States and other democratic societies.[14] Post-war affluence allowed much of the counterculture generation to move beyond the provision of the material necessities of life that had preoccupied their Depression-era parents.[15] The era was also notable in that a significant portion of the array of behaviors and "causes" within the larger movement were quickly assimilated within mainstream society, particularly in the US, even though counterculture participants numbered in the clear minority within their respective national populations.[16][17]
- ^ Liungman, Carl (1991). Dictionary of Symbols. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO. p. 253. ISBN 978-0-87436-610-5.
- ^ Westcott, Kathryn (March 20, 2008). "World's best-known protest symbol turns 50". BBC News. Retrieved June 10, 2014.
- ^ Hippie Modernism: The Struggle for Utopia|Walker Art Center
- ^ "Scoot: How the Kennedy assassination gave birth to the counter-culture 60s generation". www.audacy.com. November 22, 2021. Retrieved September 30, 2023.
- ^ a b "Where Have All the Rebels Gone?" Ep. 125 of Assignment America. Buffalo, NY: WNET. 1975. (Transcript available via American Archive of Public Broadcasting.)
- ^ Hirsch, Eric D. 1993. The Dictionary of Cultural Literacy. Houghton Mifflin. ISBN 978-0-395-65597-9. p. 419. "Members of a cultural protest that began in the U.S. in the 1960s and affected Europe before fading in the 1970s ... fundamentally a cultural rather than a political protest."
- ^ Anderson, Terry H. (1995). The Movement and the Sixties. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-510457-8.
- ^ Landis, Judson R., ed. (1973). Current Perspectives on Social Problems (3rd ed.). Belmont, California: Wadsworth Publishing Co. p. 2. ISBN 978-0-534-00289-3.
Culture is the "social heritage" of society. It includes the complex set of learned and shared beliefs, customs, skills, habits, traditions, and knowledge common to the members of society. Within a culture, there may be subcultures made up of specific groups that are somewhat separate from the rest of society because of distinct traits, beliefs, or interests.
- ^ "Counterculture." POLSC301. Saylor Academy.
- ^ "The Counterculture Hippie Movement of the 1960s and 1970s". TheCollector. September 15, 2022. Retrieved March 24, 2023.
- ^ Yarwood, Doreen (1986). The encyclopedia of world costume. Internet Archive. New York : Bonanza Books : Distributed by Crown Publishers. ISBN 978-0-517-61943-8.
- ^ "Birth Rate Chart" (GIF). CNN. August 11, 2011.
Annotated Chart of 20th Century US Birth Rates
- ^ "Baby Boom population – U.S. Census Bureau – USA and by state". Boomerslife.org. Retrieved June 9, 2009.
- ^ Churney, Linda (1979). "Student Protest in the 1960s". Yale-New Haven Teachers Institute: Curriculum Unit 79.02.03. Archived from the original on July 29, 2016. Retrieved April 18, 2014.
This unit focuses on student protest in the 60s
- ^ Frank Kidner; Maria Bucur; Ralph Mathisen; Sally McKee; Theodore Weeks (2007). Making Europe: People, Politics, and Culture, Volume II: Since 1550. Cengage Learning. pp. 831–. ISBN 978-0-618-00481-2.
- ^ Joan Shelley Rubin; Scott E. Casper (2013). The Oxford Encyclopedia of American Cultural and Intellectual History. Oxford University Press. pp. 264–. ISBN 978-0-19-976435-8.
- ^ Roger Kimball (2013). The Long March: How the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s Changed America. Encounter Books. pp. 82–. ISBN 978-1-59403-393-3.