Social, Cultural, Historical contexts in the 1960s

Social, Historical, cultural contexts 1960s and           The Avengers

The Avengers as a distinctive generic identify that is rooted in British popular culture

Television drew upon this tradition while at the same time responding to the social and cultural changes of the 1960s

Sub-genre-Spy-Thriller  

        Series 4 episode 1    

    The town of no return

Brief summary

Steed and Emma, are on the trail of several murdered agents. They visit little bazeley by the sea, a town that strangers rarely leave alive- and discovered it is being secretly infiltrated by enemy agents

The swinging sixties!

London had transformed from the bleak, conservative city, only just beginning to forget the troubles of the second world war, into the capital of the world, full of Freedom, hope and promise     

Young people given a choice

Parents of the 60s teenage generation had spent their lives in the second world war

                                                                Music

It wasn't until the early sixties

The beetles completely re invented the music industry

 they developed new sounds and experimented with new sounds

their lyrics were about rebelling against the authorities 

People stood up for their beliefs and individuality  

  

Drug culture

before the sixties people only took drugs for medical 

Recreational drugs were at their height in the 60s and became more commonly used in the latter part of the decade 

Images of Woodstock festival show people high on marijuana and LSD, dancing in fields with paint on their face and their hair flowing

                                      Feminism

• 1960s feminist movement
• Protests, women's liberation groups 
• 1965- use of contraceptive/ safe birth control. this changed the relationships attitudes of many young women to sex and sexuality
• Lawsuits for equal pay women were paid %60 less than men
• fighting for reproductive freedom- women's abortion rights 
• Women's rights in the work place women had lower salaries and worked in "pink collar" jobs such as secretaries,  

How is feminism represented in the avengers

seen as steed professional equal inspired by James bond M eMMa peele   

Sexual tension- Pad and Steel

Clothes of Peel and fighting abilities this demonstrated the modern liberation of femininity slightly ahead of fashion of her time

Leather outfit added to the highly fetishistic dimension, which was far removed from the girl next door 

Sexuality

• In 1963, The minorities research groups (MRG) became the UK's first lesbian social and political organisation they went on to publish their own lesbian magazine called arena three
• A UK opinion poll finds that 93% of respondents see homosexuality as a form of illness requiring medical treatment 
• In 1966, Humphrey Berkeley introduced a law to legalise male homosexual relations. He lost his seat in parliament due to his actions to legalise gay sex 
• Gay men who were publically gay, were either sent to prison and put into mental institutions 
• If men were sent to mental institutions, they endured experimentation, torture, pain- causing drugs and electroshock therapy as a cure for homosexuality
•  mid 60s activists became increasingly aware of the threat of prison         

                                                    Russian spies

• after world war 2 the united states and soviet union were the worlds strongest union
• The cold war (45-91) was a long period of tension between the democracies of the western world and the communist countries of eastern Europe
• there was great distrust between the soviet union and the rest of the allies
• The west was lead by the united states and eastern Europe was lead by the soviet union these two countries became known as the superpowers
• Arms race-who had the better weapon
• Space race- who could accomplish space races first
• The cold war came to an end with the collapse of the soviet union in 1991     
• Paranoia was common during the cold war- due to propaganda, ignorance, fear and secrecy
• The threat of replacement "insiders" in the Avengers reflects the paranoia generated by the cold war, compared to the more everyday threat of crime in cuffs

                                                    Ethnicity

                                                  How is context represented in the cold war

• It takes for granted the existence of a Russian spy ring in Britain
• Steed knows where their headquarters are. And this episode aired at the time when the reality of soviet unions were penetration the British intelligence
  
• English systems is seen as an obstacle, preventing the Russians from carrying out their plans. 

      

The assumptions of a common "White" culture in the 1960s Britain , despite presence of minorities  

Gender 

Steed - Personified the traditional gentleman hero

Peel-Combined femininity and modernity

Post-sexual realisation the consequences of the pill

women felt free

highly sexual

• More females than ever were entering the paid workforce, and this increased the dissatisfaction among women regarding huge gender differences in pay and advancement and sexual harassment at the work place

• By the end of the sixties, more than 80 percent of wives of childbearing age where using contraception after the federal government in 1960 approved a birth control pill- this provided a lot more women with freedom

•  Basic goals of the sixties feminists : equal pay for equal work, an end to domestic violence, restricting severe limits on women in managerial jobs, an end to sexual harassment and sharing responsibility for house work and child upbringing     

   

                                                              Men Vs Women

• The mini skirt was designed to be free and liberating for women, allowing them to "run and jump"
• in 1968 at a ford factory in Dagenham, 850 women went on strike, arguing for equal pay with their male co-workers. this action resulted in the passing of the equal pay act of 1970
• Cigarette advertisements always featured attractive men, most often in suits, but from the 1960s on, advertisements also showed rugged men in outdoor settings.