Civil Rights, Youth Revolt, and Counterculture in the 1960s and 1970s

Vocabulary practice flashcards covering the major political, social, and cultural movements of the 1960s and 1970s, including the New Left, the hippie counterculture, feminist organizations, Hispanic labor struggles, and the Red Power movement.

Great Society

President Lyndon B. Johnson's overarching social welfare policies, modeled after Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal, aimed at helping minorities and advancing equality.

Youth Revolt

A 1960s movement driven by young Americans and college-aged baby boomers demanding immediate civil rights and an end to U.S. military involvement in the Vietnam War.

New Left

A liberal political ideology embraced by young Americans in the 1960s focused on social justice; it sought to separate itself from the failures and bloodshed of the 'Old Left' (communism and socialism).

Students for a Democratic Society (SDS)

A major New Left student protest organization founded at the University of Michigan that spread across U.S. colleges, frequently staging campus sit-ins to halt university operations.

Living Room War

A term describing the Vietnam War as the first fully televised military conflict, bringing footage of combat, casualties, and atrocities directly into American homes.

Conscientious Objector

An individual who refuses military service on documented moral, pacifist, or religious grounds, an option chosen by thousands of young men resisting the Vietnam War draft.

Kerner Commission

A presidential commission created by Lyndon B. Johnson to investigate the root causes of ongoing civil unrest and urban protests, concluding that racism was the primary cause.

Counterculture

A cultural movement, exemplified by the hippies, that rejected mainstream societal norms, politics, and consumerism in favor of personal freedom and alternative lifestyles.

Communes

Rural, collective living centers where hippies gathered in remote areas such as forests or deserts, sharing food, clothing, living arrangements, and community life.

Escapism

A central tenet of the hippie lifestyle focused on avoiding the harsh realities of society and the government to seek inner peace, happiness, and unconventional experiences.

Summer of Love

A series of hippie music gatherings and cultural events during the summer of 1967 in which attendees celebrated countercultural ideals and occasionally protested the Vietnam War.

Woodstock

Widely considered the largest and most famous music festival of the 1960s counterculture movement, symbolizing the peak of the hippie era.

Betty Friedan

A progressive labor journalist and feminist activist who wrote 'The Feminine Mystique' and co-founded the National Organization for Women.

The Feminine Mystique

A 1963 book by Betty Friedan arguing that American women who gained empowerment working in WWII were systematically forced back into domestic roles by 1950s culture and consumerism.

National Organization for Women (NOW)

A moderate women's rights organization co-founded by Betty Friedan that pursued legal, workplace, and gradual institutional reforms for gender equality.

Women's Liberation Movement (WLM)

A radical feminist movement that demanded immediate and comprehensive transformation across all areas of women's personal, social, and professional lives.

Gloria Steinem

A radical feminist leader and journalist who founded 'Ms.' magazine and campaigned on issues including workplace discrimination, same-sex marriage, and reproductive rights.

Ms. Magazine

A groundbreaking feminist periodical founded by Gloria Steinem that openly addressed controversial topics such as gender bias, equal pay, abortion, and same-sex unions.

Roe v. Wade

The landmark 1973 Supreme Court decision originating from a Texas case that established a nationwide constitutional right to obtain an abortion.

Juan Crow

The regional system of legal, economic, and social discrimination enforced against Hispanic and Mexican American populations in the American Southwest.

Cesar Chavez

A Mexican American civil rights activist and WWII veteran from Arizona who organized agricultural laborers and co-founded the United Farm Workers.

Dolores Huerta

A Mexican American labor activist who co-founded the United Farm Workers alongside Cesar Chavez to demand fair wages and civil rights for Hispanic farmworkers.

United Farm Workers (UFW)

A civil rights and labor union co-founded by Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta to represent Hispanic farmworkers and advocate for labor equality.

Chicano Mural Movement

A cultural and artistic movement centered in California and the American West where artists painted public murals to celebrate Mexican American heritage and advocate for civil rights.

American Indian Movement (AIM)

A Native American protest movement and civil rights organization, also called Red Power, established to combat discrimination and protest treaty violations and the seizure of native lands.

Occupation of Alcatraz Island

An 18-month symbolic protest launched in 1969 by Native American activists who occupied the abandoned federal prison in California to protest the historical theft of indigenous lands.

Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868

A federal agreement providing that unused federal land would be returned to Native Americans, used by AIM activists as the legal justification for occupying Alcatraz Island.