In spirit of the lecture we just had regarding the beatniks, hippies, tie-dye, etc., I asked my roommate (who makes tie-dye clothes often) to take one of my blank white shirts and make me one. I thought it turned out really well and also kind of correlates to the fashion stigmas during the period we have been looking at in class.

This week in class Dr.Putnam spoke about hippies and the movement they started. Towards the end of class he presented a video that portrayed a kind of space hippie in a Star Trek Episode. This reminded me of an episode of Futurama named Bendin’ in the wind, where the character Fry and gang take an old Volkswagen that was stereotypical of hippies of the time, to travel all across the country. Along the way their clothes became stained in a kind of tie dye that hippies were known to wear. While the episode did not deal with the hippie movement itself, the way the characters presented themselves in their tie dye and Volkswagen, and the concert at the end was an homage to the life of hippies themselves.

– Nick Thips –

In small and large lecture, we have been discussing the Vietnam War and all of the protests that went along with it. The protests were a huge part of why the war is so memorable. I am currently watching House of Cards and one of the main characters is Claire Underwood played by Robin Wright. Robin Wright also plays Jenny Curran in the amazing movie (based around the time of the Vietnam War) Forrest Gump. In House of Cards, she is the wife of an important politician who ranks higher and higher in government as the show proceeds. (spoiler alert) One day, during an interview, she tells the world that she was raped and had an abortion. As a result, pro-life protestors make their voices known when they constantly protest outside of her home and cause the police to intervene. Her character is on the defense of the protestors and eventually she has to make some decisions based on these protestors. In Forrest Gump, she plays one of the protestors themselves when she becomes a hippie during the Vietnam War. As from lecture, and all of our readings we know that the protestors and the hippies from the 1960s made an impact on society and the war effort. This actress plays two very different characters on opposite sides of protests, but they both present how powerful protests and demonstrations can be when it comes to legislation. I love history and I love media so I always get excited when I can discuss both at the same time!

Talking about the Civil Right’s Movement made me think about a documentary I recently watched on HBO called “Living With Lincoln”.  It is about the Kundhart family, whose great grandfather was the first collector of Lincoln photography during the time he was alive.  The family just published their entire collection of 73,000 plus iconic photographs and journals from Lincoln’s time that gives us much more detail about his death.  It made me wonder if the civil rights movement would have occurred earlier in history if Lincoln was never assassinated.  

The free speech movement was a spark started in college campuses that really delved in on the issue of civil rights and later towards the opposition of the war in Vietnam. The movement can be most popularly associated with the movements/protests in Cal Berkeley in which students struggled to fight against on-campus political existences and activities. In addition, the SDS or Students for a Democratic Society was so involved because they were acting in response to the issues of their time alike to student rights and how the campus was impeding on their civil liberties as students.

Recently Dr Putman was talking about hippies and i found this picture of a Volkswagen, which is completely painted by hippies with their slogans and other stuff. Furthermore, this kind of Volkswagen is also kind of a symbol for hippies an their freedom.

I think that it actually doesn’t look that bad.

“Tune in, turn on, drop out, switch in, switch on,and explode.”

One of my favorite movies that depicts America at the time of Vietnam is Across the Universe.  This movie pays tribute to The Beatles while telling the love story of two college aged students and their friends and family.  Since we were talking about Hippies this week in class it reminded me of this song Mr. Kite.  This song, as depicted in the movie, shows how kids who had grown up in structured middle class families rebelled and became apart of the hippie movement.  They experimented with marijuana and LSD and made their own rules to live by.  This clip shows the “oneness” that people tried to experience, with nature and each other, while taking drugs.  Also, if you listen to the lyrics, you can also assume that The Beatles were also on drugs while they created this song.

My family and I recently went to Disneyland and as we were walking in I couldn’t help but remember how Disneyland was actually related to the Cold War and that time era. The 1950’s were often looked as a time of affluence and strong family values. A big contributor to this and the idea of conformity was the opening of Disneyland. In fact one of the first things you do when you walk into Disneyland is walk down Main Street, Main Street shares many similarities with America’s idealized version of 1950’s suburbia, including a sense of uniformity (we are all sheepol as we walk in lines everywhere), order, community and safety.

 Today in class we talked about hippies started to become popular in America. I was o tumblr and found a photo set of kid hippies and bought they were adorable. In one of the pictures you can even see a sign that says acid test like the one Dr. Putnam talked about to day with Kesey.

After discussing the Vietnam war in my small section group today, I went to a Film Society meeting where we discussed editing and some of its best uses in Film History. One of the examples we looked at was Apocalypse Now, directed by Francis Ford Coppola. In the opening sequence of the film two scenes are composited, one of the main character, obviously distressed, lying under his ceiling fan and the other of a helicopter flying past a line of trees just as bombs go off setting everything on fire. This film is considered one of the most influential war films in history because of how well it highlighted the horrors of Vietnam and war on a larger scale.