The fighting in World War II was experienced first-hand by relatively few Americans; most Americans had to rely on the press (newspapers, magazines, radio) for information about the war. Therefore, the press helped create an image of the war and helped define its meaning. The assignment is to analyze a specific episode, comparative issue, or theme in the wartime press. Make sure to combine research in period sources (newspapers, magazines, published diaries, etc.) with appropriate material from course readings (if needed). Choose a focus from the following areas or another appropriate topic of your choice.
1. Japanese-American internment—Daniels, Prisoners Without Trial is the accompanying class reading. Research could include investigation of newspaper and magazine coverage of Japanese-Americans, the court cases challenging internment, diaries by internees (several are published), or the library’s five-volume collection of primary documents associated with internment (Arthur A. Hansen, ed., Japanese-American World War II Evacuation Project).
2. American women and wartime—you can use the documentary The Life and Times of Rosie the Riveter, May, “Rosie the Riveter gets Married,” evidence from Terkel’s Good War and O’Neill’s A Documentary at War, and your own research to explore any issue surrounding women’s participation in wartime: advertisements and women, women and industrial labor, the child care debate, women in the military, and so on.
3. American response to the Holocaust and refugee questions. David Wyman, The Abandonment of the Jews is the best book. Check out press coverage, etc. What did Americans know? How interested was the press in reports of mass murder?
4. Race and the war. Look at press coverage of the March on Washington Movement, Detroit riot, or the Port Chicago incident.
5. Diplomacy at the end of the war: reactions to the atomic bomb, attitudes toward Germany, Japan, or U.S. allies. Walker, Prompt and Utter Destruction is the class reading to get you started.
6. American popular culture and the war: baseball, movies, children. A good starting place for wartime children is William Tuttle, “Daddy’s Gone to War”.
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