21H.211 | Spring 2016 | Undergraduate

The United States in the Nuclear Age

Calendar

SES # TOPICS KEY DUE DATES
1 Introductions  
2 Key Questions, Debates, and Approaches to the Nuclear Age  
Unit 1 - The Bomb and Atomic Culture
3 The Dawn of the Nuclear Age  
4 Duck and Cover: Civil Defense  
5 Domestic Containment and the Nuclear Family Unit 1 paper due
Unit 2 - Enemies from Within: The Culture and Politics of Security
6 McCarthyism and the Red Scare  
7 Sex, Gender, and the Lavender Scare  
8 Psychology in an Age of Anxiety Unit 2 paper due
Unit 3 - The Military - Industrial - Academic Complex
9 The Emergence of Computing Technology  
10 Humans, Machines, and the Reorganization of Work  
11

MIT and the Cold War

Guest Speaker Professor David Kaiser, MIT

 
12 Organization Men and Their Critics Unit 3 paper due
Unit 4 - The Politics of Space and Race
13 Suburbanization, White Flight, and Urban Crisis  
14 The Malling of America  
15 Race and the Space Race Unit 4 paper due
Unit 5 - The Global Cold War
16 The Global Cold War and the Making of Three Worlds  
17

China’s Cold War

Guest Lecturer Professor Christopher R. Leighton, MIT

 
18 Cold War Civil Rights Unit 5 paper due
Unit 6 - Rebels, Critics, and the End of Consensus
19 Delinquents and Rebels: The 1950s as Prelude to the 1960s  
20 The End of Consensus: The Student Movement and the New Left  
21 Rethinking Nature in a Nuclear Age  
22 The Return of Fear and the Anti-Nuclear Movement Unit 6 paper due
Conclusions
23 Legacies of the Cold War and the Unfolding Nuclear Age  
24 Closing Thoughts and Paper Presentations Final essay due

Course Info

Instructor
Departments
As Taught In
Spring 2016
Learning Resource Types
Written Assignments