Jacksonian Democracy
Monday, October 26th

• Rage Against the Machine, “No shelter” (4:12):
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6NEoesmnYU4
• Krs One, “Hold” (5:55):
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6YMWvhcUIl8
• Stetsasonic, “Freedom or Death” (1:42):
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZTCQ3b2eYA

• Option #1
• 30 terms to define, 60 points
• 2 page essay, 40 points
• Option #2
• 3 page critical review of literature, music, movie related to the era, 50 points, can use several, must make a coherent argument
• 2 page essay, 50 points

• “Independence” is crucial to a good citizenry, but capitalism creates a permanent class of dependent wage earners
• Independence is re-imagined around gender, men become
“independent” by making women dependent on them
• Men need a clearly defined private domestic sphere to maintain the illusion of their independence (despite being wage slaves)
• Unpaid housewife is central to the economic system, without her unpaid labor, the system of paid labor wouldn’t work
• As industrial capitalism rises, women’s work, once thought of as crucial to the home economy begins a transition to be seen as leisure (unattached women go from important extra set of hands to economic liability)

• The key to the market is demand, what is “obsolescence”?
• Make a better product, make products that fall apart, turn products into status symbols (fashion)
• Outdated sayings “see you on the flipside”, a “broken record”
• Why are teenagers so important to today’s market economy?
• They spend their own money, they spend their parents’ money, they are future customers
• The irony?
• Adults complain about kids’ behavior but they actually profit from it
• They do not want to fundamentally change schools, parents like their kids being at school, parents emulate their kids (have to stay young)
• Denying teens real power breeds the desire for status (which is great for capitalism)
• Status determining opinion (1:41):
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rdIWKytq_q4&feature=youtu.be

• Fashion vs Use Value: “dictated by top ten lists”, “hot items”, “others also bought” not needs or quality
• Consumption is crucial, why is high school so important?
• Socializes us to hyper consume by making us desire status
• Contradiction of late Capitalism?
• We need to be efficient producers, but also voracious consumers
• What is the solution?
• The “preppy” in high school who becomes the “bourgeois bohemian” in adulthood, make sure they can be producers but are also hard core consumers
• Who was a “prep”? A “brain”? A “loser”? An “alternative” (punk, goth, hippy)? A “normal”? A “jock”?

• Banks/Debt (9:31):
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Knf8KA5aAjw

Jacksonian Democracy
Wednesday, October 28th

• Michael Jackson, “Thriller” (4:51):
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hG6oy46qKE4
• Patti Smith Group, “Ghost Dance” (4:51):
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfzqX_88QzM

• Jackson and the development of political parties:
• http://www.davidwalbert.com/extras/political_parties_poster.pdf

• American System (Democratic–Republicans)
• National Bank
• Tariffs to Support American Industry
• Infrastructure
• Moral Legislation
• Missouri Compromise 1820 (36 o 30’)
• Martin Van Buren and the Democratic Party

• Crash Course 8:30-14:35 (6:00):
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=beN4qE-e5O8

• Whigs
• Democrats
• Spoils System
• Nullification Crisis
• Bank War/Panic of 1837
• Indian Removal Act

• What you rather keep your traditions and move, or adapt to be able to stay?
• What do we associate with civilization?
• What do civilized people have/do?
• Indian Removal (5:20):
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQfP2Y2t45U

• Written language, English
• Christianity
• Private Ownership
• Farming
• Patriarchy
• Civil Government
• Education

• How did Jackson approach the Native Americans?
• Pitted tribes against each other
• Bribery
• Fraudulent deals and treaties
• Torture, terrorism, and extreme brutality (cutting off noses to count the dead, making leather from skin, desecrating bodies, night raids, burning down villages, killing women and children)
• Laws designed to decimate history and culture?
• Diminished power of chiefs
• Outlaw communal ownership
• Outlawed meetings, ceremonies, and language

1984
• “The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.”

• Removal gives Native American land to poor whites, lottery system gave some away for free, sale helps to pay off the national debt
• Whiskey, Shays’, Slavery, etc.: using racial scapegoats to get poor whites to buy into the system
• Jackson legacy as president mixed at best, clearest success was decimating Native
Americans yet it seems to be a footnote
• Precedent for the way that the United States acquires territory and deals with colonial subjects (Hawaii, Guam, the Philippines, Latin America, etc.)
• Newt Gingrich 2012, asked about the Taliban “Andrew Jackson had a pretty clear cut idea about America’s enemies . . . KILL THEM.”
• The Crime: Native Americans almost universally villains, savages, aggressors, or pathetic, victimized, children of nature.
• Native Americans in Hollywood (5:22)
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hJFi7SRH7Q