Flapper and the 1920s

Homework: The Flapper and the 1920s

Directions: Complete the reading listed below. Then type out your answers to the questions. You should submit your answers to Canvass and be prepared to discuss your answers to these questions in class on the day they are due.

Readings:
1) Wheeler and Becker, Chapter 6, “The ‘New’ Woman of the 1920s: Image and Reality”
~ make sure to read the “Excerpts from EM Hull’s The Sheik

2) The American Yawp, CH22,

Homework Questions:

[Wheeler & Becker reading & The American Yawp reading] The decade of the 1920s experienced its own form of crisis, fear, and concern over the quickening pace of change. Who or what forces felt threatened by the changes taking place in the 1920s? How did this cultural tension manifest itself?
~ How did the widespread purchase of the new, mass produced automobile (Model T) help change social mores and attitudes toward sex?
~ Why did the decade long debate about the proper role of women generate so much tension?

[Wheeler & Becker reading & The American Yawp reading] Who was The Flapper? What was new about this “New Woman” of the era? Why did the Flapper, cause such a stir among an older generation of Americans?

Read the excerpts of the short story The Sheik in the Wheeler and Becker file. Like the sentimental novel, Charlotte, A Tale of Truth, the novel The Sheik was one of the most popular stories of the era, one widely read (mainly by women) and eventually turned into a blockbuster movie. In theory, reading this story should be able to tell us something important about the women who read and loved this novel, but what?
~ What comment does the story The Sheik make about the new woman of the 1920s?