Chapter 20The Jazz Age
Section 2Cultural Innovations
Art & Literature
• During the 1920s, American artists, writers, and intellectuals began challenging traditional ideas as they searched for meaning in the modern world.
Greenwich Village and the South Side
• The artistic and unconventional, or Bohemian, lifestyle of Manhattan’s Greenwich Village and Chicago’s South Side attracted artists and writers.
• These areas were considered centers of creativity, enlightenment, and freedom from conformity to old ideas.
Modern American Art
• The European Art movement influenced American modernist artists.
• Edward Hopper revived the visual accuracy of Realism.
Poets and Writers
• Carl Sandburg – used common speech to glorify the Midwest and the expansive nature of American life.
Poets & Writers
• Edna St. Vincent Millay – expressed women’s freedom and equality and praised a life intensely lived.
Poets & Writers
• T.S. Eliot – described a world filled with empty dreams and foresaw a world that would end “not with a bang but a whimper.”
Poets & Writers
• Eugene O’Neil – focused on the search for meaning in modern society.
Poets & Writers
• Ernest Hemingway – Often created characters who were “heroic antiheroes” – flawed individuals who still had heroic qualities of mind and spirit.
Popular Culture
• The economic prosperity of the 1920s afforded many Americans leisure time for enjoying sports, music, theater, and entertainment.
• Radio, motion pictures, and newspapers gave rise to a new interest in sports.
Baseball
• Babe Ruth – became a national hero, famous for hitting hundreds of homeruns (714).
Babe Ruth
Boxing
• Jack Dempsey – World Heavyweight Champion from 1919 to 1927.
Football
• Red Grange – aka “the Galloping Ghost” was one of the most famous football players of the 1920s
Golf
• Bobby Jones – best golfer of the decade.
• First golfer to win the U.S. Open and British Open in the same year.
Tennis
• Bill Tilden – dominated the tennis world.
Swimming
• Gertrude Ederle – shattered records by swimming the English Channel in a little over 14 hours.
Gertrude Ederle
The Rise of Hollywood
• Motion pictures became increasingly popular.
• The first “talking” picture, The Jazz Singer, was made in 1927.
• The golden age of Hollywood began.
Popular Radio Shows & Music
• The mass media – radio, movies, newspapers, and magazines – helped break down the focus on local interests.
• Mass media helped unify the nation and spread new ideas and attitudes.
End of Section 2
Next: Section 3African American Culture
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