American countercultures; an encyclopedia of nonconformists, alternative lifestyles, and radical ideas in U.S. history; 3v.

9780765680600

American countercultures; an encyclopedia of nonconformists, alternative lifestyles, and radical ideas in U.S. history; 3v.

Ed. by Gina Misiroglu.

M.E. Sharpe, Inc.

2009

941 pages

$299.00

Hardcover

HM647

From environmental writer Edward Abbey, author of The Monkey Wrench Gang, which helped inspire the radical environmental group Earth First!, to the zoot-suiters, a youth counter-culture that emerged among predominately African American and Mexican American youths during the late 1930s, this three-volume encyclopedia contains some 500 entries describing a broad array of topics associated with religious, political, identity, artistic, and lifestyle countercultures across American history. In order to give a sense of the topical breadth of the encyclopedia, perhaps it is useful to list some of the headings in its topic finder: arts and artists; civil rights and social protest movements; communities, settlements, and neighborhoods; consumer goods and products; cultural/historical periods and events; drugs and drug culture; ideologies and theories; literature and literary figures; film, television, radio, and alternative media; music and musicians; pastimes, fads, and recreations; religious/spiritual movements and figures; and sociopolitical movements. Specific examples of entry topics, presented in no particular order, include the Harlem Renaissance, Muhammad Ali, Andy Warhol, the Federal Arts Project, Charles Bukowski, R. Buckminster Fuller, the Catholic Worker Movement, the Industrial Workers of the World, Emma Goldman, the New Left, underground comics, the Burning Man Festival, the Sacco and Vanzetti case, the Ku Klux Klan, Jehovah's Witnesses, anarchism, The Catcher in the Rye, Easy Rider, rap music, and Johnny Cash. Entries are frequently cross-referenced and include brief guides to further reading. Also included are 26 documents, including writings by Emma Goldman, Henry David Thoreau, and Ralph Nader; political statements of the Black Panther Party and Students for a Democratic Society; song lyrics by Bob Dylan; and Harlem Renaissance poetry, to cite a few. A bibliography, filmography, and index are also included in the third volume.

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