Communism and American Life

FAIN: FV-256791-17

Emory University (Atlanta, GA 30322-1018)
Harvey E. Klehr (Project Director: February 2017 to April 2022)

A four-week seminar for sixteen school teachers on the history of and issues surrounding the Communist movement in America from the 1930s through the Cold War.

This four- week seminar for school teachers will examine the controversy over the role of the Communist movement in American history and politics, focusing on the 1930s, the period in which the Communist Party of the United States achieved its most important success, and the 1940s and early 1950s, during which anti-communism became a powerful force in American life, culminating in the controversy over McCarthyism. We will consider such questions as why people were attracted to an extremist ideology, why it gained traction, and why it ultimately failed. The seminar will approach these issues by reading several iconic novels and plays and autobiographies about the Communist issue. In addition, we will watch several movies and documentaries about the issue and use primary source documents from recently opened American and Russian archives to examine controversies about the extent of Soviet espionage in America during this period.