The counterculture movement began in the late 1950s and early 1960s as a reaction against the conservative 1950s and the threat of nuclear war. Led by the Beat Generation in New York and San Francisco, the counterculture rejected materialism and experimented with jazz, drugs, sex, and Eastern religions through literary works like Howl by Allen Ginsberg and On the Road by Jack Kerouac. The movement influenced psychedelic art and music in the 1960s, with LSD being promoted by figures like Timothy Leary before being made illegal in 1966. By the late 1960s, the counterculture had grown to include rock music and anti-war protests, but began to decline with drug overdoses and

1. Countercult
ure
Began late 1950s/early
‟60s:
Beat Generation of New
York and San Francisco
Reaction against:
conservative 1950‟s,
the Cold War,
and fear of nuclear war

2. • Non-conformist, rejected materialism
• Experimented with jazz, drugs, sex, Eastern
religions
• Mainly literary movement - idealized
energetic, uncensored expression

3. Howl by Allen Ginsberg (1956)
I saw the best minds of my generation
destroyed by madness, starving
hysterical naked,
dragging themselves through the negro
streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,
angelheaded hipsters burning for the
ancient heavenly connection to the
starry dynamo in the machinery of night,
who poverty and tatters and hollow-eyed
and high sat up smoking in the
supernatural darkness of cold-water flats
floating across the tops of cities
contemplating jazz …

4. On the Road by Jack Kerouac (1957)
"The one thing that we yearn for in our
living days, that makes us sigh and
groan and undergo sweet nauseas of
all kinds, is the remembrance of some
lost bliss that was probably
experienced in the womb and can only
be reproduced (though we hate to
admit it) in death."

5. The Naked Lunch
by William S. Burroughs
(1959)
“I am not one of those weak-
spirited, sappy Americans who
want to be liked by all the
people around them. I don‟t
care if people hate my guts; I
assume most of them do. The
important question is whether
they are in a position to do
anything about it.”
“In the U.S. you have to be a
deviant or die of boredom.
Make no mistake, all
intellectuals are deviants in the

6. Jackson Pollock

8. 1950‟s Beatniks  1960‟s Hippies

9. The Old Left The New Left
1930s-1950s 1960s-1970s
Marxist roots Democratic roots
Focused on working class Young middle-class
labor issues intellectuals; hippies and
college protestors.
Became disillusioned with
authoritarian brutality of Stalin SDS (Students for Democratic
& suppressed by 1950s Red Society)
Scare
Focus on civil
rights, questioning
authority, opposing Vietnam
War

10. Mainstream
vs.
• Individual • Community
• Competition • Cooperation
• Achievement • Happiness
• Group superiority • Equality & social justice
• Conformity/obedience • Freedom
• Materialism and money • Spiritualism, sharing
• Authoritarianism • Democracy
• Militarism/imperialism • Diplomacy/sovereignty
• Rationality/bureaucracy • Emotionality/tribalism
• Self-discipline • Laid back, go with the flow
• Delayed gratification • Immediate gratification

12. • Influenced
„psychedelic
‟ art &
music
• Made illegal
in 1966

13. • Timothy Leary -
proponent of LSD.
• Jerry Garcia - Grateful
Dead founding
member
• John Lennon – Beatles
• “The Merry
Pranksters”-Famous
group of traveling
hippies.

14. 1964 • British Invasion
The Beatles
The Rolling
Stones
The Who
• Jimi Hendrix-use
1967 of the electric
1968 guitar
1969

17. Altamont Free Concert, 1969
Manson Murders, 1969
Lost fascination with drugs;
Joplin, Hendrix, and Morrison
OD
Kent State Massacre,1970
Vietnam War winding down
Counterculture values
becoming part of accepted
culture "Mr. and Mrs. America … I am not … a hippie cult leader. I am
what you have made me and the mad dog devil killer fiend leper
is a reflection of your society … In my mind's eye my thoughts
light fires in your cities." - Charles Manson

18. Pop Art
“Art should be for
everyone!” - Andy
Warhol

22. Roy Lichtenstein

23. Whole Earth Catalog

24. Clean Air Act (1970)
Clean Water Act (1973)
Endangered Species Act
(1973)
Three Mile Island (1979)

25. Women’s Movement
1949: The Second Sex by Simone de
Beauvoir
1961: FDA approves birth control pill
1963: Equal Pay Act
1964: The Feminine Mystique by Betty
Friedan
1964: Civil Rights Act bans employment

26. “A woman needs a man
like a fish needs a
bicycle.”

27. 1966: National
Organization for Women
(NOW)
1967: affirmative action
expanded to cover sexual
discrimination
1968: Miss America Pageant
protest
1968: Shirley Chisholm
elected first black
congresswoman.

28. 1972: Equal Rights
Amendment (ERA) sent to
states for ratification
1972: Shirley Chisholm
wins three states in
Democratic Party in
Presidential primary
election.

29. 1973: Roe v. Wade declares laws prohibiting abortion
are unconstitutional.

30. 1974: Phyllis Schlafly
forms STOP ERA
1978: Elaine Noble first
openly gay state legislator
in Mass
1978: more women than
men enter college
1978: Pregnancy
Discrimination Act bans
employment discrimination
against pregnant women

31. 1979: Margaret Thatcher
becomes first female
Prime Minister of the
United Kingdom
1982: ERA falls three
states short of
ratification