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Chapter 3

increased in length, but it offered even
fewer ways of demonstrating maturity
than in the previous century.
The combination of a lengthy
childhood and delayed responsibility led
to the development of a youth culture.
High school students embraced new
fashions which deviated substantially from
their parents’styles.These teens listened
to new forms of music,created new forms
of dance,developed their own slang
expressions,and often embraced freer
attitudes toward sexuality,smoking,and
drug use than their parents.What came to
be known as ageneration gapcaptured
the essence of these dramatic differences
between parents and teens (Caplow,Hicks,
&Wattenberg,2000).Sidebar 3.3
illustrates some of the conflicts parents
faced with the new generation of children
and the parent-child conflicts which
ensued.
Concern over teenage delinquency,
high pregnancy rates,and the perceived
immorality of rock music led to laying
blame on inadequate parenting,rather

than on the difficulties inherent in the

changing dynamics of family life in the

1950s and 1960s.

Cultural Upheavals.The emergence of

the civil rights movement,the anti-nuclear

movement,and thebeat culturemarked

the 1960s as an age of rebelliousness,a

SIDEBAR3.4

THECIVILRIGHTSMOVEMENT

The Civil Rights Movement was at a peak from

1955–1965.The14th,15th,and16thamendments

to the Constitution laid the foundation for

Congress to pass the Civil RightsAct of 1964 and

theVoting Rights Act of 1965,following nearly a

decadeofnonviolentprotestsandmarches.These

ActsguaranteedbasiccivilrightsforallAmericans,

regardlessof race.Thetelevisionreportingof civil

rights workers,sit-ins,marches and protests,and

the bloody, violent, and sometimes inhuman

responsefrompoliceandNationalGuard,brought

toAmerica’sconsciencetheseverityandinhumane

treatmentofAfrican-Americans(Cozzens,1998).

Someofthemorenotableprotestsincludethe

Montgomery bus boycott in 1955; the student-

led sit-ins of the 1960s; the Freedom Ride of

1961; Birmingham in 1963; the march on

Washingtonin1963;FreedomSummerof1964;

and the Selma,Alabama,protest in 1964.

AdditionalinformationabouttheCivilRights

Movement and these protests can be found at

thesewebsites:

http://www.watson.org/~lisa/blackhistory/civilr

ights-55-65/index.html(accessedJune24,2009)

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/aaohtml/exhibi

t/aopart9.html (accessed June 24,2009)

http://www.infoplease.com/spot/civilrightstime

line1.html (accessed June 24,2009)

SIDEBAR3.3

FEAR OFROCK’NROLL

OnMay4,1966,JohnLennonproclaimed,“We

[the Beatles] are more popular than Jesus.”My

father (like many other Christian fathers) took

offense at this statement and forced me to take

all of my Beatles albums out back and burn

them—every one of them!

—Anonymous