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Cultural changes in the 1920s - Coggle Diagram
Cultural changes in the 1920s
Jazz Age
Jazz became associated with a general cultural revolution which encompassed singing and dancing
black American singers achieved widespread popularity - Bessie Smith and Billie Holiday became household names
Development of commercial radio aided the process
Black musicians like Louis Armstrong began recording records which were bought by black and white fans
By 1929, jazz was a form of music played across the USA
Jazz accompanied new dance crazes like the turkey trot and the charleston which replaced sefate waltz
Also took their music - white musicians ended up playing jazz
Growth of jazz was not universally popular - country areas (whites) were still attracted to country music
During the Great Migration in the 1920s, 850,000 went north to find employment and leave segregation
Jazz was denounced by groups like the KKK and others who saw this and other cultural changes
Developed by black Americans in New Orleans, Louisiana around 1895
In the 1920s most of the Midwest and South took part in a Protestant religious revival
Leading preachers like Billy Sunday and Aimee Semple McPherson condemned jazz as the music of the devil
Jazz was USA's greatest contribution to world music
Harlem Renaissance
Universal Negro Improvement Association - founded and led by Marcus Garvey
He believed in Pan-Africanism - black people all over the world should be united in a struggle for equality
Organisation aimed to celebrate black American achievement and support the struggle for equal rights
He founded seperate black-only businesses including a shipping company
Magazine the
The Crisis
produced by the National Association of the Advancement for the Advancement of Colored People
Singers like Florence Mills and Ethel Waters performed in a number of growing black American theatres and nightclubs like the Cotton Club
Black American community in northern cities began to assert its unique identity
Important destination in the migration from the South in the 1920s
Harlem was a black American ghetto on Manhattan Island
Growing popularity of baseball
Newspapers developed sports sections with extensive coverage of the MLB
Ball used had cork interior benefited the batters - high scoring games which was attractive to watch
Growth of commercial radio allowed people across the country to listen to games
MLB remained segregated - first black player was Jackie Robinson after WW2
Baseball benefited from the boom - workers had more money to spend and boom fuelled demand for spectator sports
In 1920, Negro Baseball League was created - poorly financed than its white counterpart
Appointment of Kenesaw Mountain Landis as baseball commissioner cleaned up the image of baseball by stamping out corruption and banning substances he felt enhanced player performance
Negro Baseball League attracted large crowds of black Americans and gave the opportunity to play the sport professionally
Baseball began the 1920s in controversy - 1919 World Series saw the White Sox team accused and convicted of match fixing against the Cincinnati Reds
In 1920, Yankees signed Babe Ruth for $100,000 - became the greatest baseball player of all time - won the World Series
Baseball teams like the New York Yankees and Chicago White Sox became household names and players became national celebrities
By 1929 most major cities had a baseball stadium which could hold thousands of fans
By 1920s, baseball was becoming America's pastime
Radio and cinema
Charlie Chaplin was the world's first global film star
1915 - first full length feature film Birth of Nation captured immigration - president had private showing which helped relaunch the KKK
Up until 1927 all films were silent allowing them to be enjoyed all over the world
Advent of talking films - Laurel and Hardy became the most popular comic film partnerships - westerns and romances were also produced by Hollywood
Hollywood became the centre of the world film industry
Hollywood helped create celebrities - represented the American dream that poor people through hard work could become rich and famous
Growth of radio led to mass advertising - KDKA was the first commercial radio station in 1920
Through newspapers and magazines, lives of Hollywood stars became an obsession for many Americans
Radio was important as the motor car in bringing Americans together and making them believe the USA was the leading country
Not everyone was pleased with spread of cinema - religious moralists were concerned that films could be used to undermine the Christian ethos of the country
Radio was an important medium during the religious revival - Aimee Semple McPherson broadcasted her religious services across the nation from her Church in california
Film studios appointed Will Hays to produce code of censorship - lasted from 1930 to 1968
Americans did not have to leave their home to hear entertainment or sports
1927 - revolution took place with the invention of talking pictures - The Jazz Singer which make Al Jolson an international start overnight
Radio brought entertainment into the homes of millions of Americans regardless of where they lived
Hollywood began the oscars in 1929 - films were premier form of popular entertainment for Americans and made the USA the top country for popular culture in the world
Broadway in NYC became the centre of America's industry
Until radio, Americans visited theatres which were located in big cities
American literature
Produced Farewell to Arms about his own life as an ambulance driver
Both achieved both national and international acclaim and gave American literature a global reputation
Traces of Americans living in Paris and Spain experencing the excess of life
International standing was matched by poets Ezra Pound, T.S Elliot and Robert Frost
Another novelist, Ernest Hemingway, wrote The Sun Also Rises in 1925
Saw the USA lead the world in popular culture and reach the world stage in literature
1920s was an 'age of excess' according to Fitzgerald
His novel the Great Gatsby (1925) deals with a rich playboy who made a fortune on the NYSE
Was famous for capturing the spirit of the rebellious youth of flappers, the new rich and those who defied the prohibition
Novelist who encapsulated the spirit of the times more than any other was F. Scott Fitzgerald