There has
never been a decade quite like the sixties; the diversity, conflicts, hope,
anger, the music, the dance crazes and the fun that characterized these years
are captured here. The 60s decade was a decade of change. Not only were those
changes evident in fashions but world events, music of the 60s, automobiles,
toys, and individual self expression as displayed during the largest outdoor
rock concert ever performed, Woodstock. The television shows of the fifties
and sixties depicted the morals and values of our society. The simplicity
of our lifestyle were so evident at that time. The westerns on the televisons
series were about the good guys always winning.
informaiton on the infamous Woodstock can be found
by clicking here or on the picture to the left!
The 1960s, pronounced "the Sixties", was
the decade that started on January 1, 1960 and ended on December 31, 1969.
It was the seventh decade of the 20th century.
The 1960s term also refers to an era more often called The Sixties, denoting
the complex of inter-related cultural and political trends in the United States,
Canada, Argentina, Brazil, Spain, France, United Kingdom, Italy, Australia,
West Germany, Japan, Mexico, Yugoslavia and others.
In the United States, "The Sixties", as they are known in popular
culture, is a term used by historians, journalists, and other objective academics;
in some cases nostalgically to describe the counterculture and social revolution
near the end of the decade; and pejoratively to describe the era as one of
irresponsible excess and flamboyance. The decade was also labeled the Swinging
Sixties because of the libertine attitudes that emerged during this decade.
Rampant recreational drug use and casual sex has become inextricably associated
with the counterculture of the era, as Jefferson Airplane co-founder Paul
Kantner mentions: "If you can remember anything about the sixties, then
you weren't really there."
The 1960s have become synonymous with all the new, exciting, radical, and
subversive events and trends of the period, which continued to develop in
the 1970s, 1980s, 1990s and beyond. In Africa the 1960s was a period of radical
political change as 32 countries gained independence from their European colonial
rulers.
Some commentators have seen in this era a classical Jungian nightmare cycle,
where a rigid culture, unable to contain the demands for greater individual
freedom, broke free of the social constraints of the previous age through
extreme deviation from the norm. Christopher Booker charts the rise, success,
fall/nightmare and explosion in the London scene of the 1960s. This does not
alone however explain the mass nature of the phenomenon.
Several governments turned to the left in the early 1960s. In the United
States, however, John F. Kennedy, an anti-communist, who advocated massive
tax cuts at home, was elected to the presidency. Italy formed its first left-of-centre
government in March 1962 with a coalition of Christian Democrats, Social Democrats,
and moderate Republicans. Socialists joined the ruling block in December 1963.
In Britain, the Labour Party gained power in 1964. In Brazil, João
Goulart became president after Jânio Quadros resigned.
