Resources for Learning More about Social Movements and Culture

Bonus Chapter. Peace Symbols: Poster Art in the Vietnam and Iraq Antiwar Movements

Books and Articles

Bloom, Alexander, and Wini Breines, eds. Taking It to the Streets: A Sixties Reader. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995.

Breines, Wini. Community and Organization in the New Left, 1962–1968. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1989.

Calvert, Gregory. Democracy from the Heart: Spiritual Values, Decentralism, and Democratic Idealism in the Movement of the 1960s. Eugene, OR: Communitas Press, 1991.

DeBenedetti, Charles. An American Ordeal: The Antiwar Movement of the Vietnam Era. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press,1990

Gitlin, Todd. The Sixties: Years of Hope, Days of Rage. New York: Bantam Books,1987.

Kunzle, David, Nguyen Ngoc Dung, and Susan Martin, eds.Decade of Protest: Political Posters from the United States, Vietnam, Cuba, 1965–1975. Santa Monica, CA: Smart Art Press, 1996. See bibliography for other books.

Rawls, Walton. Wake Up, America! World War I and the American Poster. New York: Abbeville Press, 1979.

Small, Melvin, and William Hoover, eds. Give Peace a Chance: Exploring the Vietnam Antiwar Movement. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1992.

Sontag, Susan. "Posters: Advertisement, Art, Political Artifact, Commodity." In The Art of Revolution: 96 Posters from Castro's Cuba, 1959–1970, ed. Dugald Stermer. New York: McGraw Hill, 1970.

Sale, Kirkpatrick. SDS. New York: Random House, 1973.

Multimedia

Berkeley in the ’60s.First Run Features, 1988. Directed by Mark Kitchell. Traces interwoven strands of radical activity in Berkeley, including the Free Speech Movement, the anti-draft campaign to shut down the Oakland Induction Center, and the Black Panthers.

Hearts and Minds. Criterion, 1974. Emotionally manipulative academy award–winning documentary offering revealing portrait of the Vietnam War from the contrasting points of view of politicians, generals, soldiers, and vets against the war.

Rebels with a Cause. Shire Films, 2000. Directed by Helen Garvy. Excellent history of Students for a Democratic Society based on interviews with key members.

Underground. De Antonio, 1976. Directed by Emile de Antonio and Mary Lampson. Based on clandestine interviews with Weather Underground fugitives, this documentary makes an excellent contrast to the 2003 film Weather Underground.

Vietnam: In the Year of the Pig. De Antonio, 1968. Directed by Emile de Antonio. Widely considered to be the best documentary film on the Vietnam War ever produced. Certainly the best made while the war was still in progress, and best on the French background to the war.

The War at Home. First Run Features, 1979. Directed by Gene Silber and Barry Alexander Brown. Powerful documentary about the antiwar movement in the United States through a focus on one important site, Madison, Wisconsin.

The Weather Underground. New Video Group, 2003. Directed by Sam Green. Superb film on the evolution of SDS from young idealists to bomb-building revolutionists.

Posters on the Web

Another Poster for Peace
Anti War Posters
Design Action Collective
Drawing Resistance
Étapes
Free Anti-war Posters
Peaceposters.org
Peace Signs
Protest Posters
Protest Records
Stop Wars: Threads of Change
WAR: Campaign on Iraq Poster Exhibition

Websites

ANSWER: Act Now to Stop War and End Racism. A major U.S. and international progressive coalition of hundreds of groups fighting the Iraq war and its roots in colonialism and racism.

Center for the Study of Political Graphics. A major resource archive with over 50,000 posters and other political graphics, on- and off-line exhibits, books, links, and a vast amount of information.

CODEPINK Women for Peace. A creative, seriously humorous women-centered peace and justice direct action group.

Decade of Protests: Political Posters from the United States, Cuba, and Viet Nam, 1965–1975. Includes a historical essay and a fascinating collection of images from the Sixties Project.

Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR). Since 1915, one of the most influential radical pacifist and social justice organizations.

Lead Pipe Posters. A commercial site that includes a number of political posters from the 1960s and 1970s.

MoveOn.org. The most successful Web-focused liberal group in the battle against the war in Iraq and other issues.

Posters American Style. A broad-ranging exhibit that includes a section on “Patriotic Persuasion” featuring military recruitment and antiwar posters, among others. From the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Powers of Persuasion: Poster Art from World War II. Useful historical archive of images from the National Archives.

Promotion, Persuasion, and Propaganda. Excellent media studies course that includes work on “The Art of Protest: From Vietnam to AIDS,” in the context of a wider look at advertising and propaganda.

SDS. A good starting point for finding online resources about Students for a Democratic Society.

Sixties Project/Vietnam Generation. Excellent site on the Vietnam War and related sixties movements and experiences.

United for Peace and Justice. The largest U.S. progressive peace and justice coalition fighting the Iraq occupation and connecting it to other key social issues via some 1,300 coalition group members.

Vintage Political Posters. A commercial site, but worth checking out because it has a rich and varied collection from around the world.

When I’m Out on the Street. Political comics and posters by Mike Fluggenock.

Win Without War. One of the largest liberal coalitions against the war and occupation of Iraq.

WILPF: Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom. Since 1915, a major voice internationally and inside the United States for peace based on structural changes for justice and freedom.

Yo! What Happened to Peace? Posters about the Middle East conflicts.

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