Thesis:
The abrupt loss in wealth and the lack of jobs caused by the Great Depression produced an epidemic of fear throughout the United States. People who could let go or move past the fear were able to act towards others in kindness, whereas those who held onto the fear treated others with hate. Although economic status does in no way determine a person's moral reasoning, during the Great Depression the people who had lost everything, more often were led towards unity and compassion.
Artist Statement
The Great Depression was a trying time in our history, it presented the people of the United States with many economical and emotional difficulties. It is not the proudest moment for our country but it is a very important one. As we look into our past we can marvel at all the accomplishments and successes but we also must look at our mistakes and losses and learn from them. With the economic recession we are currently coming out of, it is crucial to look to the past for guidance. We like to think that the past is the past but as Griffin talks about in his book The Creature form Jekyll Island, with a subject like economics, unless something is changed, the past tends to repeat its self. Not only is the Great Depression a learning tool for economics but it also gives us a look into human behavior in high stress situation. By looking at peoples response to this disaster we can infer about the nature of human beings as I did above in my thesis.
I originally wanted to create a video through Adobe After Affect where I could use quotes from my sources. I found the language in The Grapes of Wrath beautiful and inspiring and I wanted to find a way to incorporate that into my project. When my first idea fell through I started in a different direction. Instead of focusing on The Grapes of Wrath I wanted to focus more on the economics of the time. My first thought was a game of some sort that would give people a basic understanding of the economic causes of the Great Depression. That idea didn't end up working either. Finally I ended up deciding to make tape people. I had seen them at a couple other exhibitions and thought they looked very cool. As I thought about it more, an image started to form in my head. The last sentence of my thesis started to shift and morph into an idea for a project.
Two of the tape figures are more in a crouched position to represent the people in the Great Depression that lost much of their wealth and who are struggling to find a job so that they may feed their families. Their hands are wound together and their bodies are tilted towards each other to portray a feeling of unity and kindness. The other figure that is standing up and has a more rigid stature represents the upper class during the Great Depression, more specifically those who still had something to lose. This figure is standing alone with its head tilted away from the two on the ground. The way it was positioned portrayed how the people who had economic status during this time acted in cruel and selfish ways because of a fear of losing what they had. The quotes were used to enhance and make the meaning of the project more direct. Each person had quotes that directly supported my claim about each class during the Great Depression.
The quotes on the three people came from the sources that I read/watched during the independent study. They mostly came from The Grapes of Wrath but I also incorporated quotes from the movie The Great Depression and the textbook Out of Many. The language in the Grapes of Wrath is very beautiful and unique and I knew that I wanted it to be integrated into my project. The other sources supported and contributed to my thesis so I made sure to use them as well, but the language wasn't quite as inspiring. I quoted all my sources except the book The Creature From Jekyll Island. I learned a lot from this book and it was excellent addition to my research and enhanced my understanding of the economics of the Great Depression, however I could not check it out of the library in time to gather quotes to use in my project. Nevertheless, it did contribute to my thesis. In the book Griffin, the author, did not specifically talk about the moral reasoning on the different classes during the Great Depression but it did reflect on the corruption and causes perpetrated by the wealthy class. Even though this book focused on a completely different topic than the other three, there were patterns that were universal throughout the four sources. On such pattern I created my thesis.
Bibliography
Faragher, John Mack, Mari Jo Buhle, Daniel Czitrom, and Susan H. Armitage. Out of Many: A .............History of the American People. 6th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2000. Print.
The Great Depression. Perf. Mario Cuomo. Towers Productions Inc., n.d. DVD.
Griffin, G. Edward. The Creature from Jekyll Island: A Second Look at the Federal Reserve. ...........Westlake.Village, CA: American Media, 2002. Print.
Steinbeck, John. The Grapes of Wrath. New York: Penguin, 1997. Print
Reflection
This semester in honors humanities each person had to choose a historical event that interested them and learn about it. I chose to study the Great Depression because it is an important event in the history of the United States that I felt I didn´t know a lot about. My great grandfather would talk about the Great Depression and how he married my great grandmother when she was sixteen because her father could no longer afford to take care of her. The idea of someone marrying at sixteen was crazy to me. I wondered what would the circumstances have to be for me to marry at that age. This want to understand my grandparents lives also drove me to chose the Great Depression. The cause of this economic downfall intrigued me and was another reason I chose this event. It was a pretty open ended project and allowed us to find something that we wanted to learn about. Once we had chosen an event the next step was to create research questions and find sources about the event. My two main research questions were: What are some of the theories of why this economic down fall occurred? How did the fear that engulfed the people during the Great Depression affect people moral reasoning? We had to have four to five sources. Through these books, movies, plays, etc. we had to answer our research questions and come up with a thesis. We than had to create a project to represent our thesis. This project could be anything we wanted. A painting, a sculpture, a paper, etc. the sky was our limit. The only requirements was that it portrayed your thesis and that you sources integrated multiple sources.
The two most challenging aspects of this project was time management and self direction. I think of myself as a pretty organized and responsible person but during this project I encountered many instances where I felt totally overwhelmed and unprepared. This was due largely to the fact that we as students had to complete four books, a documentation binder and a project over the course of a semester. It was not the lack of time to complete this project, but the fact that we had to find the time that was the difficulty. With all my other classes and activities it was hard for me to make time to complete something with a due date that seemed so far off. Over the course of this project my understanding of what it means to really manage you own time grew. I learned how to create a calendar where I made my own due dates and held myself accountable to them. The freedom with this project was wonderful but also terrifying. We had to find our own sources, create our own questions, come up with our own thesis and create our own project. One thing that I know about myself is that I have a tendency to make things harder for myself. With that comes re-planning and refining. I changed my project idea so many times I can barely keep track, and my thesis went from economics to morality. This project helped my recognize this about myself as well as taught me that sometimes things are better left alone. Having to self direct is something that is hard for me and causes much stress but in the long run makes me a better and more independent student.
At the beginning of this project I had this fantasy that I would come out of the project understanding the economics involved in the cause of the Great Depression. I was sorely mistaken. Economics is a complicated confusing mess that can't seem to make up its mind. There was no way that I could understand it in only a semester from a book. Despite this, at the end of my research I began to craft a thesis about the economics of the Great Depression. Luckily I found sense and change the thesis to something I understood and had a firm grasp on. This change to my project and thesis was the best thing I could of done. It allowed me to look deeper into the moral reasoning of the people during that time and in the end made my project better. This project reminded me of math. When you can't understand a problem you get very frustrated and spend way too much time on it and in the end don't get it right. Instead of struggling with the problem of economics, I moved on to a more manageable topic.
For next year honor students who are smart enough/ stupid enough to embark on this journey I give this wisdom. First, make a calendar and stick to it (it only takes five to ten minutes to make and prevents much stress). Second, this may seem obvious but choose something your genuinely interested in, take the time in the beginning to make the middle and end better. Also choose sources that interest you. Lastly, use your teacher! She is your best resource when it comes to practically everything, Dip into that well of knowledge. For my lovely teacher Ashley Carruth I would suggest finding a way to fit it into one semester. There was just something depressing about it dragging out until January. Start at the end. Meaning lay everything out and explain the documentation binder, the thesis statement, and the project even before project proposals. Lastly, make more in class time for the honors. I don't mean two hours where you could work on you regular humanities homework or your honors, but actually work time. More of what we did when the rest of the class had a other assignment. Maybe take an X-block or SIG. It's a difficult task but I believe in you.
Research Questions:
· What are some of the theories of why this economic downfall occurred?
There are many theories of what caused the Great depression. With each theory there came multiple factors. The most well-known theory has to do with the crash of the stock market, the over production of goods and the crash in the banking system. After World War I there was a boom in production but it didn't quite match the demand. As the companies began to lose money because of an inability to sell their products the workers were the first expense to go. Of course, putting consumers out of jobs just made the demand problem worse. The stock market crash is a bit more confusing but I believe the gist of it was that there was dramatic decrease in the cost of stocks, which cause a frenzy of buying. The only problem was that the prices never went back up. As stock owners began to realize this there was another frenzy only this time to sell but there were very few buyers. As the demand went down so did the prices, soon you could barely give away free stocks. This caused stock holders to lose massive amounts of invested money. Because of the layoffs and the crash in the stock market the people of the United States began to panic. This caused a massive withdrawal of money from the banks, which in turn caused many backs to shut down. A lot of people didn't get their money out in time and lost their savings. All this of course led to more fear so less consumption of goods which continued to cause more layoffs. So went the ruthless cycle.
In the book The Creature from Jekyll Island, there is a theory about why the boom and bust happened and it has to do with fiat money. This is money that is based on nothing. Commodity money is based off of gold and other precious metals. When the Federal Reserve was created it allowed for large sums of money to be loaned out without the Fed actually having this money. Banks can do the same thing. This all creates inflation and economic instability. As the banks create more money they don't actually have, the less the value of the money becomes. Also if the banks lend money to people that doesn't actually exist and then charge interest they are require people to pay them money that doesn't actually exist. This instability in the economic system caused the boom and bust that then lend to the Great Depression.
· How did the fear that engulfed the people during the Great Depression affect American people moral reasoning?
To begin with the fear was what cause the demand for goods to plummet and then lend to layoffs. But if we look more closely at how it affected their moral reasoning we find both horrific and inspiring deeds. In The Grapes of Wrath they talked about the family-like mentality that a lot of the migrant workers felt towards each other. An example is when the Joad family has just reached California and are making food. The children from other people in Hooverville come up and ask for food. Even though they can barely afford food for their family, Ma Joad shares their food. This shows that even in the most horrific of situation, goodness and kindness can shine through. The Great Depression had a positive effect on the Joads family in that it gave the opportunity to stare poverty right in the face and instead of becoming greedy with the little they had they laughed at poverty and shared anyway. They showed that not even hunger could skew humanity and moral compass.
Of course the desperation and fear brought on by the Great Depression also caused people to be greedy and selfish and cruel. An example of this is in The Grapes of Wrath when the farm and plantation owners lower wages so much that they become unlivable or when the car sales man deliberately tries to make an unfair deal. It also made the people of California angry and cruel. Their fears propelled them to prejudice and hateful. They had such scorn and disgust towards the immigrants. The corruption in the police force and the rigging of the cotton scales are more examples of when peoples moral compass was skewed by the fear brought on by the Great Depression. This fear of starvation, invasion, violence and desperation caused a change in people's moral reasoning skills, sometimes for the best and sometimes for the worst.
Sources:
Grapes of Wrath
Summary:
In this novel the author takes his reader through the struggles of a family during the great depression. He uses this family to show what people experienced and felt during these hard times. It is a story of a journey tackled in the hopes of a better life and the numerous obstacles along the way. The Joads' are a poor farming family living in Oklahoma. The story starts out with Tom who just got released from prison. He was headed home to his family's farm. When he gets there, he finds that the house has been demolished and the land taken over by the bank. The land is now covered in cotton and farmed with tractors by big industries. Here he meets the retired preacher Casy and the nut job Muley. Muley tells him that he can find his family at his Uncle John's house. Muley's family had already headed to California seeking jobs but Muley had refused to be pushed off the land he was born on. Casy continues with Tom to his uncles house to find that they too had plans to travel to California. There had been posters put up everywhere advertising the abundance of good jobs in California. Since the bank had kicked them off their land they had no source of income therefore they had decided to seek jobs in California. Casy asked whether he can come along they say that he may. After purchasing a car they start on their long journey. They are met with many obstacles, car trouble, their dog gets hit by a car, places to sleep, and their money supply get steadily lower. They are one of many families traveling to California in the hopes of a new life. They hear warning that there are no more jobs in California but they press on. They are no longer a group of Oklahoma farmers but now migrant workers. Grampa Joad dies on the journey. Noah also decided to stay and live off the land in the desert of California. Even with these casualties and continuous warnings they press on. Granma is now desperately ill. When they reach California Granma Joad is dead and they have no way to bury her properly. They realize quickly that California was not all it was advertised to be. They spend the night in a place called Hooverville. It is very crowded and there are corrupt police that harass the poor migrants who have set up camp. Here they learn of the tension between the workers and the large farm owners. They see massive unemployment and those that are employed are paid ridiculously low wages. The family learns of the hate for the migrant workers. When a man they met demands fair wages and a contract for a fruit picking job, the police are called and he is arrested. The police then start to taunt the others. A police gets knocked out and someone has to take the blame so Casy volunteers. Connie has abandoned Rose and their unborn baby. They carry on and find a nice government camp. Tom gets a small amount of work but soon, even though they love the camp, they must move on in order to find work. They travel to a peach picking job. There are angry man outside the farm. They soon realize they are strike breakers. They begin with a payment of five cents per box of peaches but it is soon lowered to two and a half cents. Tom goes to investigate what's going on outside the fence and finds Casy as a leader of the strike. The police finds them and kill Casy and then Tom kills the police. His face is all beat up so he cannot pick without looking suspicious. The wages are unlivable so they continue on to a cotton picking job. It pays better but there are so many workers that the job lasts only a couple days. They are now living in a box car with another family. Ruthie brags that Tom kill two men so he then has to flee. Winter is coming and all the cotton is picked. A giant storm hits and it starts to flood. Rose is in labor and they must decide whether to stay or leave. She gives birth to a still born and is devastated. Uncle John goes to bury the child and instead sends it down the river in the hope that "they" will see what they've done. Al falls in love with the daughter from the other family. Ma Joan says it's time to leave, Al refuses to go and stays with his love. Now all that's left of the clan is Ma, Pa, Uncle John, Rose of Sharon, Ruthie and Winfield. They set out of the road in the pouring rain in search of shelter on higher ground. They find a barn that is occupied by a boy and his dying father. He needs some liquid sustenance. Rose of Sharon, having just had a child, volunteers to save the man. She then smiles mysteriously.
Critical Analysis:
I can´t decide whether I love or hate this book. The writing and description are amazing but it is was a 464 page book and it was depressing. It´s one of those books where every word you read might have some unknown meaning. There are some beautiful metaphors in this book that I´m not sure I have a handle on. Even the title of the book, Grapes of Wrath, I´m not sure I fully know what he was trying to say. The only time he mentions the grapes of wrath is in chapter 25 page 477: "In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." From this quote I get that the rage and anger of the migrant population is growing like a grape on a vine. This book is filled with hardship. In fact I would say that it is practically all hardship. The Joad family seems to reach a point of misery where they take a neutral perspective on their situation. In the book, they talk about the women watching the men, waiting to see if they have broken. They are relieved when they see rage and anger because anything better than nothing. It is this rage that keeps them from becoming vegetables. You can see in the book that their expectations and perspectives shift. All the immigrants wanted is to work so that they may feed their families. This really took hold in me. I complain and stress about school and getting an A but all they want is to have work. Food, something almost everyone in Durango takes for granted, is their constant concern. It's all about your perspective.
Connection:
The outside connection that I made is class war. We saw it during the revolution and we saw it during the great depression. There was such a large gap between the rich and the poor. In this book we see rebellion in the forms of riots and strikes, post revolution we see people taking up arms against the government. We also see a class war today with the Occupy Wall Street movement. This rebellion happened in a more peace protest way. No matter the means of rebellion they were all brought on by similar causes. The rich getting richer the poor getting poorer and the injustice involved with power and money.
The Creature from Jekyll Island
Summary:
In 1910 a group of important representatives from Wall Street held a secret meeting on Jekyll Island to create the Federal Reserve. Their intent was to kill the competition of the newer banks, have a way to create money out of nothing to supply loans and have the taxpayers to compensate for the inevitable losses. The FR made bailouts possible by giving in-debt corporations large sums of money created out of nothing. This caused inflation. Commodity money is money that is based completely in gold. This form of currency has been seen to bring about prosperity. Fiat money is money that is not backed up by gold or any precious metals. It has been known to bring about disaster, inflation, unemployment, loss of property, and political turmoil. Fractional money is money that only part of it is backed up by precious-metals and always ends up becoming fiat money. American money is completely fiat. This is what allows the FR to create money out of nothing. The Great Depression contributed to our current financial state because it opened the doors for the government to step in when the economy is struggling. This changed the law of supply and demand. This so called safety net also increased unsound business practices and high-risk investments(Ch. 4). Our money is based on debt. If the US paid off all its debt there wouldn't be any money left. Fiat money causes inflation and creates a boom and bust effect. The founding fathers banded fiat money in the constitution warning us of its destructive ways. The U. S. was brought into World War I because the British and French were in desperate need of financial add. The aid that the U.S. offered came mostly from the Federal Reserve causing massive inflation. Backing up money with government bonds was the last straw that caused the U.S. to fall into never ending debt. As Griffin states, "...to save the English economy for depression. This was accomplished by deliberately creating inflation in the U.S. which caused an outflow of gold, a loss of foreign market, unemployment, and speculation in the stock market, all of which were factors that propelled America into the crash of 1929and the great depression of the 30's."(429) The FR was essentially a central bank in disguise. At the end of the book he proposes a plan to end the FR.
Critical Analysis:
My first response to this book was to pull my comforter over my head and give up and this feeling never really went away. This book was frustrating but also intriguing. It gave me a basic level of understanding about what the Federal Reserve is and how it works. I think that Griffin has a very cynical view of our banking system. He seems to be a very smart guy but when he started getting into some of his theories of why the FR was created or when he talks about the evil people that were essentially greedy, self-centered men who were out to get everyone else, I can tell there is bias. He has some very persuasive arguments. When he talks about fiat money and the turmoil that it brings I can't help but be frustrated with people's greed. If commodity money brought such prosperity then why did the people from the past have to take just a little more. I've always found the human race's obsession with excess so interesting. When the Lions are done eating they leave the rest of the carcass to the scavengers, humans on the other hand would rather let it rot than let someone else have it. Of course I am not saying that all humans are like this but it only takes one. It reminds me of in The Grapes of Wrath when the land owners rig the scales and the workers in turn begin to fill their bags with rocks. It only took one person using receipts that are not back up by a precious metal to set the whole thing off. Why does someone need millions of dollars? I get that we want security and luxury but most millionaires spend most of their life working and even with excessive spending can't spend it all in one life time. The reasons that Griffin claims to be why the FR was created is hard for me to believe because I just don't get why someone would want money and power than the prosperity of a country.
Connections:
Griffin's writing style and cynical view of the government reminds me of Zinn's in his book A Peoples History. This book definitely connects to the morality of justice aspect of this semester of humanities. It's all about the corruption that is the Federal Reserve and the corruption in our government that contributed to this. He talks about congressman's votes being bought by lobbyists and big businessmen. Griffin also discusses secret meetings that are held by the powerful and wealthy to plot global conquest. The author Griffin is looking for justice and is making a call for us, the American people, to stand up and make change. In this book he also addresses the first world war, and the crash of the stock market as causes of the Great Depression. The book The Grapes of Wrath, and this book both are about the hardships caused by greed. The Grapes of Wrath is more about individuals in a specific time and the greed of the land owners brought on by fear and hate where as The Creature from Jekyll Island is more about calculated greed that causes harm throughout history and still exists today.
The Great Depression:
Movie Produced by Towers Productions Inc. for History, Executive Producer: Jonathan Towers, Host and Narrator Mario Cuomo
Summary:
This movie covers the politics, the people and the economics of the Great Depression. At the start of the Great Depression many blamed on war and the current president, President Hoover. The blame also lay on Wall Street. Farming slumped and farmers began to dump their products or just not harvest them because the cost was too much. The demand for goods vanished. This movie also mentions marathon dancing and how people needed some sort of entertainment to get them through this hard time. It also talked about the massive migration west. It talked about the dust storm that caused crops to fail and the people of Oklahoma to search or work in other places. The movie talks about the race for president and FDR's rise to power and the New Deal and how it created jobs. The CCC was government-funded projects that put people to work and provided them with steady jobs and reasonable pay. This alleviated the depression but did not cure it. This movie also talked about some of the strikes that occurred during the Great Depression. The film also covers the textile mills and the Steel worker's strikes. It also discussed the war veteran bonus movement sometime known as The Battle of Washington. This movie concluded that what finally brought the U.S. out of the Depression was World War II. This provided the jobs needed to promote prosperity in the U.S. The movie talked about how one fear dissolved into another fear. People no longer feared starvation, but instead bombs and communism. One of the overlying themes of this movie is the good that came out of the GD. Some of these were the unity that it promoted. It brought people that had nothing together to share what they did have. It also talks about how because of the Great depression we are much more prepared for future economic issues.
I was actually surprised by the overall tone of this movie. When you think of a documentary on the Great Depression you expect it to be depressing. The positivity in this documentary was very refreshing after reading The Grapes of Wrath. This movie didn't talk very much about the causes but there were some useful tidbits. It talked a little more about Black Tuesday and the crash of the stock markets. Though there was definitely a coming together of the people of the U. S. during the GD, there was also a fair amount of separation and hostility. The different economic classes for instance became bitter toward each other. I find it intriguing that an event can cause both a coming together and a moving apart. One of the reasons was because the poor seemed to be uncivilized and a burden on society to the middle and upper class. I was also interested in how a misconception could lead to hate and disgust. Secondly the poor are hostile towards the other classes because of jealousy or unfair treatment. As I see in The Grapes of Wrath, there is also tension between the people of California and the migrants flooding from other states in search of work. As seen in the movie there is also hostility towards the government and those who run it in the form of strikes. The people needed someone to blame. The GD resulted in some unity in the people but also some disconnect.
Outside Connection:
The book Snow Falling on Cedars, the movie The Great Depression, and the book The Grapes of Wrath show what it was like for an immigrant from another state. They are really quite similar. They are traveling to a new place for better opportunities and are met with hostility. For example, the Joad family in The Grapes of Wrath are called "Okies" and the Japanese Americans are called "Japs". Both have derogatory names that are used freely. The movie talks about strikes and protests and we learned about the uprising that occurred during the revolution. Both were the poor demanding their rights. In the movie they talked about Wall Street and its involvement in the GD and today were are having a protest, Occupy Wall Street, to change the corruption involved.
Out of Many: A History of the American People
Chapter 24 Page 848-852
Summary:
The Great depression in the 1930's was the biggest financial crisis America has ever seen. In the 1920's, the stock market boomed and stock values along with stock purchases sky rocketed. All these stocks then went on a downward spiral in 1929. On October 29th, the day of Black Friday, a panic gripped the stock holders and in desperation they began to frantically trade and sell stock. They were sold for extraordinarily low prices or weren't able to sell at all. This caused a halt in demand. When there is no demand the cycle of supply and demand no longer existent and the stock market comes to a stop. By November $30million in the stock market had been wiped out. This crash in the stock market was down played by President Hoover and his administration. The stock market crash did not cause the Great Depression but didn't help it.
There were many suspected causes of the GD. One such cause was the over production of goods. (850) Another suspected cause was the unequal distribution of wealth. The stock crash made buyers uncertain and hesitant. Over-production and hesitant buyers equals layoffs and low salaries which in turn equals less consumption which equals more layoffs and lower salaries. The people of the United States began to make large withdrawals of money from the banks. The banks soon shut down and many people lost all their life savings. Massive unemployment of the middle and lower class came next.
Critical Analysis:
Connections:
In the Grapes of Wrath they cover the physical hardships but also the mental. The theme of mental hardship is seen throughout the book. The women look at the men to see if they are broken. This shows deep despair of the men and the fear that the women felt at the idea that their husbands and fathers might break mentally. Of course the text book didn't get quite as in depth about the emotional climate of this time but it did talk about the fear and the hopelessness that came with the Great Depression. The book The Creature from Jekyll Island is all about the economics involved with the Federal Reserve. It specifically talked about fiat, basically money that is created with being back up by anything, and how this system causes a boom and bust pattern in our financial system. This text book talks about the boom right after World War I and the bust that came after which was the great depression. Additional Questions:
· Would the Great Depression have happen if people had been more willing to spend?
· Could the GD have been prevented if the people had stayed calm?
· How did the Great Depression change the people of U. S.'s view of their country?
· Was everyone affected by the Great Depression? If not then what was the key to their success?
· Is there any way that the U. S. could go back to commodity money?
· Are we going to see history repeat itself?
· How do we prevent something like the Great Depression from happening again?
· Did the Great Depression unite or break the people of the U. S.?
· Where did all the money go?
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