HIST 4443 America in the 1990s

Fulfills the U.S. requirement for History Majors. The 1990s is popularly remembered as the decade of baggy jeans, reality television, Beanie Babies, flip phones, and neon colors. But the 1990s witnessed dramatic transformations in America and the world. The Cold War ended, the welfare state retracted, political parties became more polarized, immigration diversified, mass incarceration expanded, the AIDS crisis persisted, and the Internet became commonplace. In this seminar we will examine these changes in American politics and society, as well as analyze the cultural texts (songs, films, fashion, and other phenomena) that reflected and shaped the period.