HIST 2240 - America in the Vietnam Era

1. Demonstrate in discussion and in writing an informed historical perspective on significant social, political, military, diplomatic, economic, and cultural phenomena and personalities of the 1960s.
2. Engage critically in evidentiary and interpretive debates from and about the era.
3. Understand the rapid changes and conflicted nature of group identities and cultural paradigms of the period.
4. Examine and explain the operation of key ethical, social, and philosophical issues and ideas of the sixties, such as non-violence, civil disobedience, the rights of the state, etc.
5. Understand and identify competing and allied interests of various groups and individuals contesting for acceptance and power in the sixties.
6. Articulate linkages between the historical experience of the sixties and the contemporary United States.

1. Post-World War II American cultural consensus
2. The Cold War and American foreign policy
3. The fraying of the consensus
4. The rise and fall of civil rights; black nationalism and Black Power
5. The Vietnam War, there and here
6. Politics, governance, and the mainstream social change
7. The student movement and the counterculture
8. The Nixon Presidency and the new consensus