The USA 1945–1974: The People and the State

Led by Richard Hofstadter Simulacrum

A non-British depth study for OCR GCSE History A — the relationship between the American people and their government from the early Cold War at home through the Civil Rights movement to the dissent and division of the late 1960s.

1. Module 1 ○ Open

   Post-War Challenges in the USA 1945–1954

   Led by Richard Hofstadter Simulacrum

   The question

   Why did victory abroad turn American fears inward? You will study the government's concern about internal Communism and its responses, the Red Scare of the late 1940s including Hoover and the Rosenberg case, the nature of and reaction to McCarthyism, and the position of African Americans under Jim Crow in education, voting, and employment.

   Outcome

   You can explain the post-war anxieties of American society, connect McCarthyism to the recurring "paranoid style," and describe the position of African Americans on the eve of the Civil Rights era.

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2. Module 2 ○ Open

   Civil Rights in the USA 1954–1964

   Led by Richard Hofstadter Simulacrum

   The question

   How did the Civil Rights movement force the federal government to act? You will study Brown v. Board of Education, the Montgomery Bus Boycott, the leadership of Martin Luther King, the roles of the SNCC, SCLC, and NAACP, the opposition from state authorities, the contributions of the Supreme Court, Kennedy, and Johnson, and the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

   Outcome

   You can explain the methods and achievements of the Civil Rights movement to 1964, weighing grassroots organisation, legal strategy, moral pressure, and federal power against the depth of the opposition.

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3. Module 3 ○ Open

   Government and Dissent c.1964–1974

   Led by Richard Hofstadter Simulacrum

   The question

   How did the American consensus fracture into an age of dissent? You will study Black Power and Malcolm X, the movements of Native Americans, Chicanos, women, and gay Americans (including Betty Friedan, NOW, and Stonewall), the achievements of feminism, the anti-Vietnam War protests, and the divisions around Johnson's Great Society and Nixon's welfare pledges.

   Outcome

   You can explain how the demand to be counted as a full member of the nation broadened from one movement to many, and how the dissent and the backlash against it together reshaped American politics.

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