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For Future Reference
Sources from this issue, for futher reading
James Rorty, Our Master's Voice: Advertising (1938)
About as close to "classic" as "classic" gets when applied to works
of advertising criticism. This 1938 critique of the industry shows that
Rorty was ahead of his time. Funny, too.
Eric Barnouw, The Sponsor: Notes on a Modern Potentate (1978)
A concise and readable history of advertising in radio and television,
including a brief section on the Advertising Council. Smart.
Maureen Honey, Creating Rosie the Riveter (1984)
Inger Stole suggests chapter one as an excellent treatment of the War
Advertising Council's woman power campaign.
Jane Healy, Endangered Minds (1990) and Failure to Connect:
How Computers Affect Our Children's Minds and What We Can Do About It
(1998). Endangered Minds is the more interesting of the two, although
a bit dated now. It is among the few books addressed to a lay audience
that looks seriously at media's influence on children's development: effect
on language skills, attention span, and physical movement. Healy has a
tendency to "biologize" complex issues and often seems to equate humans
with "brains." Yet despite these weaknesses, she broaches serious questions
in a smart, accessible way. Most of the material in Failure to Connect
was too obvious and familiar to draw me in (the major points are summarized
in a good article-Todd Oppenheimer's "The Computer Delusion," Atlantic
Monthly, July 1997).
Learning in the Real World
An organization "dedicated to a rational examination of the costs and
benefits of education technology." The website has several critical articles
on computers and learning.
History Matters
Superb portal for American history resources on the web: primary documents,
images, video, you name it. Designed for high school and college history
teachers, but recommended.
American Memory,
from the Library of Congress
More than 5 million items from more than 90 historical collections. Jaw-dropping.
I found this via History Matters.
Michael Barson and Steven Heller, Red Scared! The Commie Menace
in Propaganda and Popular Culture (2001)
Nice sampling of posters, book covers and other images of red hysteria.
The collection has the unfortunate effect of turning red-baiting into
camp fodder (the text is rather tangential), but-hey-the pictures are
cool.
Consumers
Research and Consumers Union history
Ad Access
Images for over 7,000 U.S. advertisements, mostly from 1911 to 1955. The
best archives of old advertisements on the web. Adflip.com, which focuses
on a later period (1940-present), is also quite good.
Frances Fitzgerald, America Revised (1979)
An intense study of history textbooks that raised many of the points Loewen
made later. Fitzgerald's book is less reader-friendly and more ambitious
intellectually than Loewen's. It's great, but with neither an index or
bibliography, a bit frustrating as well.
James Loewen, Lies My Teacher Told Me (1995) and Lies Across
America (1999).
The first book, which examines history textbooks, is highly recommended.
The followup, which looks at historical monuments, has some interesting
points, but is more anecdotal.
Bessie Pierce, Civic Attitudes in American School Textbooks
(1930) and Public Opinion and the Teaching of History in the United
States (1970)
My friend Rick swears by Pierce's books (and calls Loewen a lightweight
in comparison). I'll have to take his word for it, though, because the
library doesn't have these.
Daniel Boorstin, America: The Democratic Experience (1973).
Although he's a bit of a conservative crank, Boorstin's books are among
my favorites on American history. He has a uncanny knack for sifting out
the interesting points of any subject.
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