Social Memory and the 60s: From Nixon to Nostalgia

The 1960s were watershed years in the US. From the Civil Rights movement to the Vietnam War, women’s liberation to Woodstock, a series of revolutions occurred during this decade. How do we remember the 1960s? How do we understand its legacies embodied in texts, images, music, memorials, and rituals? This class uses the interdisciplinary methods of memory studies to answer these questions by analyzing primary sources and learning new collaborative research methods. Students interested in sociology, anthropology, and history will find new approaches to enduring questions about how societies remember and forget crucial events and experiences.