Modernity and the Great Depression - (Culture America (Hardcover)) by Kenneth J Bindas (Hardcover)

About the Book

Modernity and the Great Depression explores how the worst economic, social, and political crisis in the last century created the space for a national conversation about the ideals of modernity--order, planning, and reason.

Book Synopsis

Choice Outstanding Academic Title

Order, planning, and reason--in the depths of the Great Depression, with the nation teetering on the brink of collapse, this was what was needed. And this, Kenneth J. Bindas suggests, was what the ideas and ideals of modernity offered--a way to make sense of the chaos all around. In Modernity and the Great Depression, Bindas offers a new perspective on the provenance and power of modernist thought and practice in early twentieth-century America.

In the midst of a terrible economic, social, and political crisis, modernism provided an alternative to the response of many traditional moralists and religious leaders. Promoting a faith based in reason, organization, and planning, modernists espoused a salvation that was not eternal but rather temporal, tangible, and, for a generation with so little to hold onto, eminently practical--one that found virtue in pleasure and private pursuits. After surveying the contested definitional terrain of "modernism" and "modernity," Bindas tracks their course and influence through such government programs as the Civilian Conservation Corps and the National Youth Administration; in the massive American Expositions and World's Fairs that heralded progress and a better future; on the efforts of women interior decorators to update and enhance the comforts of the modern home; and--thanks to the proliferation of electricity and radio--on the popular and high-culture musical recordings and broadcasts that reinforced a shift away from traditional modes of performance and reception.

In the transformation he describes, Bindas also locates the limits of modernism's influence, as later generations confronted the spiritual shortcomings of its ultra-rationalist and materialist paradigm.

Review Quotes

"In Modernity and the Great Depression: The Transformation of American Society, 1930-1941, Kenneth J. Bindas beautifully illustrates how the main tenants of modernity became part of Americans' everyday lives. While many studies describe the transition in American society from traditional to modern, few describe in detail how that transition took place in the lives of average Americans. In clear, insightful and engaging prose, Bindas' imaginative combination of New Deal programs, World's Fairs, interior decorating, and music illustrate the multitude of ways that modernism worked into Americans' lives and provided meaning during the Great Depression. No other study combines such diverse topics to create a unifying understanding of how Americans responded to the tumultuous 1930s."--Charles J. Shindo, author of 1927 and the Rise of Modern America

"A new and persuasive interpretation of American modernism in the 1930s, grounding the modernist movement not in high culture but in everyday life. Bindas focuses on the New Deal, religion, world's fairs, interior decoration, and popular music. A book every student of the Great Depression should read."-- Richard Pells, author of War Babies: The Generation That Changed America

"In this vibrant, well-researched, and wide-ranging account of New Deal programs and cultural developments, Bindas illuminates modernity's role in restoring contemporaries' faith in tomorrow. His work raises provocative questions: Why have we lost faith in the power of order, planning, and reason to create a better world? Bindas's intervention calls us to reconsider both modernity's possibilities and its limitations."-- Sharon Ann Musher, Democratic Art: The New Deal's Influence on American Culture

"Bindas convincingly recasts the Great Depression and New Deal as the era when ordinary Americans bought into the hopes and ideals of modernism. In wide-ranging thematic chapters, his provocative, engaging narrative spans the histories of religion, music, material culture, and politics to demonstrate Depression-era Americans' singular preoccupation with the promises of modernity for building a better world."-- Alison Collis Greene, author of No Depression in Heaven: The Great Depression, the New Deal, and the Transformation of Religion in the Delta