Beats 2

0:02the

0:031950s was a decade when Conformity was

0:06considered a virtue you know and again

0:08that makes sense if you think about

0:11people who would have been in their 30s

0:1240s and 50s during the 1950s so people

0:17who um had had kids and were raising

0:20them people who were kind of in the

0:23middle of their careers you know these

0:25are people who are referred to often as

0:29the Great

0:30generation they're the people who had

0:32grown up during the Depression and

0:35survived that they had gone off and

0:37fought the second world war and won that

0:40so really their their childhood their

0:43youth and their early adulthood was

0:45marked by a lot of Social and economic

0:48upheaval right um the first 25 or 30

0:52years of their life were were really

0:54difficult but the 1950s the economy was

0:58on an economic boo that would last until

1:01the early 1960s the there was a growing

1:04middle class in America that made the

1:06American dream seem more secure than

1:10ever before if you looked around it

1:13looked like there were people who had

1:17been different ethnically racially

1:20religiously before the second world war

1:23who now fit into American life and a lot

1:27of that fitting in depended upon Thea a

1:30ability of good middle class jobs and

1:32paychecks and lives Americans of the 50s

1:36were um conformist they really wanted to

1:41downplay divisions based on ethnicity

1:45race class religion and political

1:49affiliation um these things didn't

1:53really seem like they needed to be

1:55problems anymore in fact insisting on

1:57difference was a problem because it

2:00insisted there was something that wasn't

2:03going right in the United States so for

2:04a generation of

2:06people who had been through so much

2:09change in the 20s 30s and 40s they

2:12really relished the idea that the 50s

2:14was a time that would make it possible

2:17for more people than ever before to as

2:20as they would have seen it have the

2:21freedom to fit in so giving more people

2:26the opportunity to fit in and be like

2:29other people people was seen as a virtue

2:31in the 1960s particularly if you think

2:35about that that Conformity not as a form

2:39of like coercion or social control but

2:42if you can think of people embracing it

2:44because of the cold war you know a lot

2:46of people felt

2:47like you needed to fit in you wanted to

2:50fit in because then you were living a

2:52life that demonstrated that American

2:54life was Superior to Soviet life and in

2:57the context of the Cold War that was

2:59really really quite important now having

3:02said that there's a small group of

3:05intellectuals and artists who are

3:07associated with Columbia University in

3:10New York City who criticized this

3:13mentality they tended to argue that the

3:15freedom to fit in was repressive and

3:18that it was a threat to fundamental

3:20American

3:21Liberties um they argued that by

3:24conforming Americans were avoiding

3:27dealing with important differences

3:30in the United States and that ultimately

3:33that would weaken Society so these

3:36people are worried that by ignoring

3:41difference Americans aren't confronting

3:44problems with race in the Civil Rights

3:46Movement they're worried that people

3:49aren't recognizing that homosexuality

3:52was normal in the United States and that

3:55it was a real thing they were worried

3:57that people weren't dealing with uh

4:00religious difference that not everybody

4:02could necessarily meld into a generic

4:05Christian America and so without dealing

4:08without confronting these problems these

4:11intellectuals at Columbia believed there

4:13was no way to really have an authentic

4:15American Life there was no way to be

4:17honest a lot of these

4:20Colombia University intellectuals were

4:24seen as outcasts you know the other Ivy

4:26League schools the the Princeton the

4:29Harvard the yales were places where

4:32people dressed alike they dressed

4:35correctly they embraced manners of the

4:38well-bred Elite Class of the United

4:40States they they came from the best

4:42background so these intellectuals at

4:44Colombia by rejecting all that were seen

4:48as kind of dangerous Outsiders in a lot

4:50of

4:51ways the this is not a huge group of

4:54people but there there were a lot of

4:57people like them at Columbia in New York

5:00who rejected that sense of middle class

5:02Conformity one of the most important was

5:05a guy named Allan Ginsburg Ginsburg was

5:08awkward he was shy he was Jewish uh he

5:12was gay so he was he had a lot of

5:16qualities that didn't make him somebody

5:18who fit in easily in middle class

5:21America he wasn't built for Conformity

5:23he's also really young and when he

5:25starts at Colombia he's only 17 years

5:28old this is in in 19 1943 the war still

5:32on he didn't know when he got to school

5:36at Colombia if he was impressed by by

5:39the people there or if he wanted to

5:41ridicule its values you know they tended

5:44to see him as a spinley Jo kid with horn

5:47rimed glasses and big ears they saw as

5:49somebody who didn't fit in so on one

5:52hand Ginsburg is really smart and likes

5:55being at school likes being in I League

5:57school because it's a place where he can

5:59challenge himself but

6:01also he was uncomfortable with the idea

6:04that he was seen as an outsider that he

6:06wasn't accepted for his intellectual

6:08gifts and

6:09interests one of ginsburg's very close

6:11friends was uh a man named Jack carak

6:16Ginsburg would go on to be a poet kowak

6:18was more of a novelist and a

6:20memoirist uh kowak wasn't like a lot of

6:23people at Colombia because he was a

6:26working class guy from LOL Massachusetts

6:28so he came from this poor Blue Collar

6:31background um he wanted to be a writer

6:35um kind of a Hemingway kind of guy um

6:38and he come to Colombia on an athletic

6:41scholarship that's really the reason he

6:42gets there from working class lws

6:45because he was a running back on the

6:46football team um but he quit football uh

6:50and he dropped out of the school because

6:52he didn't think that he could become the

6:54kind of Rider he wanted to become and be

6:57a student at Colombia he felt like the

6:59professors he met were two conformists

7:03they wanted him to be traditional in his

7:06writing style and subjects and and you

7:08know kowak wanted to be this as I said a

7:12Hemingway kind of figure so a big guy

7:14who lived a big life and had adventures

7:17and wrote about them uh their friend

7:19Jack Carr said of him that he was a

7:22seaman with who was a novelist a poet

7:26who was Jack London esque so this was

7:28somebody that that his his friends in

7:31the beat circle saw as potentially a

7:34great writer because of who he was as an

7:37individual not because of his family

7:39background not because of his formal

7:41training but because of who he was so

7:44again at a time when to get along and be

7:47successful you need to be conformist

7:50kowak you know strengths were not in

7:53Conformity but in individuality so that

7:56made him somebody who was attractive to

7:57this group of people who were trying to

8:00figure out how to resist conformist

8:03thinking so that they could preserve

8:06important freedom of speech and other

8:08forms of

8:10Liberties um Ginsburg would um in caroak

8:15kind of fed off of each other uh

8:17Ginsburg hadn't dropped out or hadn't

8:19left Colombia yet caroak has but they're

8:22all kind of hang out in the same bars

8:24and the same parties the same reading

8:26groups and um Ginsburg gets in trouble

8:30because he had he had heard a story at

8:34one of these gatherings told by their

8:36friend Carr Lucian Carr and he turned

8:40the sto that that story he heard into an

8:42essay a creative writing uh essay and in

8:46that story he talks about uh this young

8:50man who was car fighting off an older

8:53man who had stalked him and then talks

8:55about like stabbing this older man uh

8:57before throwing the knife away and

8:59having to spend like two years in jail

9:02um so Ginsburg turns in the story about

9:07a gay man being pursued by another man

9:09and then killing the guy and doing jail

9:11time and the lit Professor who he wrote

9:15the story for that Ginsburg wrote the

9:16story for um said the story was smudy

9:20that it was it was basically

9:22pornographic and turned him into an

9:24assistant Dean uh and this assistant

9:26Dean said look if you're going to be a

9:28student here you you can't write this

9:30kind of stuff anymore you've got to

9:31write good poetry and good literature

9:34you've got to quit hanging out with

9:36kowak this was a formative moment for

9:38Ginsburg you know to him this Dean

9:41telling him who he could hang out with

9:43and what he should write was a sign that

9:46Colombia wasn't going to prepare him to

9:48be a meaningful writer that he wasn't

9:50going to be a good thinker he he came to

9:53feel Ginsburg like he needed to write to

9:56write about good and bad experiences so

9:59we could be honest um and he thought

10:02this was a healthy way to think because

10:05it meant that one was free

10:07intellectually um he believed in the

10:09idea that the healthier you were the

10:11more straight the straight world or the

10:14normal World wanted to Define you as

10:16sick and limit your freedom

10:18so Ginsburg comes to see this group of

10:21people he's been hanging out with as

10:23more legitimate than the university he's

10:26going to because they were at least

10:28honest they didn't limit what you

10:31thought and what you believed and what

10:32you wrote about and he could never

10:34become a writer who was serious and was

10:37read widely if he would just conformed

10:40and wrote nice stories that that

10:42professors told him people would want to

10:45read so how this helped turn them into a

10:49counterculture is what I'm going to talk

10:51about next in lecture