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The Rise Of Rock And Roll In The 1950s And 1960s

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The Rise Of Rock And Roll In The 1950s And 1960s
Shauna Haney
University of Mississippi
April 14, 2016

The outbreak of Rock and Roll in the 1950s and 1960s sent most traditional Americans into a state of cultural shock. Discussions of Rock and Roll loomed over family conversations as they tried to distinguish whether or not its extreme popularity attributed to transformed family values. The rise of the Freedom Movement erupted many different dynamics, however, the only thing that remained unchanged was the segregated American society.
The paradoxical nature of the 1950s and early 60’s was evident to all individuals, and it soon dominated the United States as a whole. With the emergence of such large cultural awakenings, the doors that opened to
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Rock and Roll took a hold of teenagers in a way they had yet to experience. Pennington believed that the corruption parents were receiving from teenagers was consequently because of Rock and Roll effects. Pennington felt that “the inner conflict between conservative and rebellious forces for high school teenagers who wanted to rebel against their parents yet still grow up to be them.”
On the other hand, Ronald Oakley from God’s Country: America in the fifties America, approached his argument from a different view than that of Pennington. Oakley saw Rock and Roll as un-liberated and as a higher rated form of conservative diversity. He did not feel that the teens were breaking away from the traditional views their parents held before them in previous decades, only that their point of view on their current world surroundings mirrored the day and age in which they had been raised in. He argued that even so they departed ways from their parents more conservative views, they still help account to both conservative and basic attitudes about life and leisure. While both Pennington and Oakley make valid points, one could assume that neither was correct nor incorrect. Yes, Pennington was correct to generalize that teenagers did become rebellious with the emergence of Rock and Roll and more liberated views as compared to elders, but in conjunction to Oakley’s view point one could also point out that those same teenagers labeled rebellious were only reacting to the affluent age and culture that surrounded them in the newer decades, those being the fifties and

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