Superman

Monomyth (Joseph Campbell)
1. Hero ventures away from the everyday world into one of supernatural wonder.
2. Hero successfully struggles against fabulous forces.
3. Hero returns to the everyday world to bestow benefits on the people.

American Monomyth
1. A community in harmonious paradise is threatened by evil.
2. Normal institutions fail to contend with the threat.
3. A selfless superhero emerges to renounce temptation and redeem self and community.
4. His decisive victory restores the community to its harmonious state.
5. The superhero recedes into obscurity.

Zorro
Tarzan
Doc Savage
The Shadow
Dick Tracy
The Phantom

Jerry Siegel
Joel Schuster
Action Comics #1 1938

Detective Comics (DC)
Marvel Comics

Superman's first era: Hero as lone redeemer
Puritan captivity myth
Vigilante justice (Westerns, Batman)
Superman's second era: Hero as defender of institutions
World War II
Cold War
Supermans's third era: Hero as modern, sexualized figure
Vietnam
Gets married, loses powers, dies

Disney's America

Walt Disney
Victorianism - repression, rationality, gentility, separtation of reason and emotion
Modernism - rejected separation of reason and emotion, civilization and savagery; embraced instinct and subjectivity, abstraction; embraced folklore, the childlike, the nonrational
1928 - "Steamboat Willie" - first animated talkie
Sentimentality, naturalism - more realism, presentation of perfection as an attainable ideal.
1940 - Fantasia
Sentimental Populism
1955 - Disneyland (Adventureland, Fantasyland, Frontierland. Tomorrowland)
Forced Perspective
Enhanced Reality
Imagineering
Disney World
Epcot Center

The Western

Manifest Destiny
Rugged Individualism
American Eden
Harmony of Man and Nature

Key Novels
1826 The Last of the Mohicans, James Fenimore Cooper
1849 The Oregon Trail, Francis Parkman
1872 Roughing It, Mark Twain
1902 The Virginian, Owen Wister

1882 Buffalo Bill Cody's Wild West Show
Sitting Bull
Annie Oakley

Silent Westerns
1894 Thomas Edison - first silent westerns
1905 The Great Train Robbery
Tom Mix (1st "B" western star)
1923 The Covered Wagon
1929 The Virginian

1930s Gene Autry, Roy Rogers, Hopalong Cassidy

1939 Stagecoach
John Ford
John Wayne
1952 High Noon
Gary Cooper
1953 Shane
1956 The Searchers
1962 The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence
1964 A Firstful of Dollars
Sergio Leone
Clint Eastwood
1969 The Wild Bunch
1990 Dances With Wolves
1992 Unforgiven

Self-Help Culture

Progressivism (1890-1920)
Types of Progressive Reform
1. Economic - "Monopoly"
2. Structural and Political - "Efficiency"
3. Social - "Democracy"
4. Moral - "Purity"
Young Women's Christian Association (YWCA)
National Consumers' League
Department of Labor Children's Bureau and Women's Bureau
Settlement Houses - Jane Austin's Hull House (Chicago)
Prohibition (1920-1933)

Self-Help Movement (1890s)
Samuel Smiles, Self-Help (1859, UK)
John Harvey Kellogg
Seventh Day Adventists' Health Reform Institute (Battle Creek, MI)
William Griffith Wilson ("Bill W.")
Robert Holbrook Smith ("Dr. Bob")
Twelve-Step Programs
Alcoholics Anonymous, or AA (1935)

The Magazine Revolution (1890s)
Munsey's Magazine (1889)
McClure's, Cosmopolitan
Ladies' Home Journal
Edward Bok
"Beautiful America" Campaign

Etiquette Columns
Godey's Lady's Book
Sarah Josepha Hale
Dorothy Dix
Mary Elizabeth Sherwood
The Howe sisters
Emily Post's Etiquette: The Blue Book of Social Usage (1922)
Irma Rombauer's Joy of Cooking (1931)
The Van Buren sisters (b. 1918): Ann Landers and Dear Abby

Television Age
Julia Child (1960s)
Phil Donahue (1970s)
Oprah Winfrey (1980s)
Martha Stewart (1980s)

Gambling: Our National Obsession

1612 - 1621: First colonial lotteries
1758: Colonial MA lottery to fund French & Indian War
1777: Continental Congressional Lottery
1803: New Orleans becomes first American gambling city
1822: First American casino opens in New Orleans
1895: Slot Machine invented by Charles Fey
1902: Matt Winn takes over Churchill Downs
1911: Matt Win introduces parimutuel betting at Churchill Downs
1919: Chicago "Black Sox" scandal

Las Vegas History
1904: Railroad built through Las Vegas
1930: Hoover Dam construction begins
1932: Apache Hotel opens in Las Vegas
1946: Bugsy Siegel opens the Flamingo Hotel
1950s: Congressional investigations into Las Vegas gambling
1955: Liberace headlines at The Riviera Hotel
1959: Film Oceans Eleven opens
1966: Caesars Palace open
1968: Circus Circus opens as the first themed family casino

Fast Food Nation

Steamboat Eating
Erie Canal (1925)
Transcontinental Railroad (1869)
Harvey Houses (1875)
Frederick Harvey
Harvey Girls
Diners
Jukebox (1905)
Self-contained refrigerator (1931)
Stainless steel cutlery (1921)
Automatic toaster (1924)
Electric Mixer (1931)
Formica (1930)
Lunch Wagon (Walter Scott, 1872)
Howard Johnson's (1930s)
White Castle (1921)
Walter Anderson
Billy Ingram
McDonald's (1952)
"Speedee System"
Ray Kroc

Race, Rock and the Soul of Rebellion

Jump Blues
Louis Jordan, "Jumpin' At The Jubilee", 1942
Rhythm & Blues
Ray Charles, "What'd I Say", 1955
Country Music
George Jones, "White Lightning", 1959
Chicago Blues
Muddy Waters, "Get My Mojo Workin'", 1954
Chess Records
Chuck Berry, Johnny B. Goode, 1958
Memphis Rockabilly
Sun Records
Jerry Lee Lewis, "Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On", 1957
Elvis Presley, "Hound Dog", 1956
Motown (Detroit)
Smokey Robinson, "Tracks of My Tears", 1965
Martha and the Vandellas, "Dancing In The Street", 1964
Stax Records (Memphis)
Sam & Dave, "Soul Man", 1967

Hip Hop
Jamaica (1962 independence from England)
Sound Systems
Selectors
Specials
Dubplate/Dub
DJ Kool Herc
The Bronx
"the breaks"

The Four Elements of Hip Hop
1. Graffiti
2. B-Boying
3. DJing
4. MCing
Sugarhill Gang, "Rapper's Delight", 1979
Afrika Bambaataa, "Looking For the Perfect Beat", 1983
Grandmaster Flash, "The Message", 1982