The 60s Research Paper

The ‘swinging 60s’ is the idea that lots of attitudes were becoming liberal and new ideas were becoming liberal and news ideas were being introduced like new fashion trends. From the three representations, the best one will give a clear picture of whether ‘swinging 60s’ apply to British society in the 60s. Therefore, this essay explores how the representations portray the 60s and how swinging it is. This essay will compare how each representation is accurate, comprehensive and objective on portraying which is the best representation.

The impression Representation 1 gives is the 60s still faced ‘economic hardships’ which doesn’t make the 60s appear ‘swinging’ because the 60s still faced difficulties. The source mentions that ‘things now regarded

It focuses on the ‘swinging’ aspects of the 60s such as the 1966 world cup win and actresses like Jane Fonda. The pictures chosen for representation 2 are accurate because in 1966 the England national football team won the world cup. However the representation is not very comprehensive because the back cover of Remember the Sixties does not consist of pictures of negative things that may have not made the 60s appear as ‘swinging’. It doesn’t state that in 1955, the number of violent crimes against people was 6000 and in 1969, this increased to 21,000. This would give the representation a different impression of the 60s as it wasn’t all just fun and music, as the 60s still faced problems like crime and the problems women faced towards equality and freedom such as not receiving an equal amount of pay and the idea of being in a ‘nuclear family’. This representation gives a more positive and ‘swinging’ impression on the 60s than representation 1 gave because this representation focuses on achievements like winning the world cup, whereas the other representation emphasises on the lack of consumer good and ‘economic hardships’. The purpose of representation 2 is to include pictures on the back cover that can lead to people reading the book. In order for people to read the book they would want to include pictures that make the 60s appear as exciting and ‘swinging’, therefore this representation is objective because the pictures

It states that it ‘didn’t swing, they didn’t even sway gently’. This suggests that the article makes you want to think that the 60s were not ‘swinging’ one bit. The article is accurate as it talks about ‘Twiggy…the poster girl’. This was true because Twiggy appeared in magazines to spread new fashion trends. Furthermore, it states that women ‘married the first man who asked’. This is accurate as in 1968, the average female marriage age was 22, which shows that females were getting married early and quickly. Even though representation 3 mentions a lot of information it still isn’t comprehensive. This is because it mentions that ‘in the 1960s Beatlemania hit the country’. This doesn’t give the full picture as the article does not mention that the most popular single in 1964 was in fact Ken Podd’s ‘Tears’ which was more traditional. Furthermore, to make the article more comprehensive they could mention that the amount of female MPs did not change, so that the readers are aware that in the 60s females faced equality problems, which would reinforce its point as while big changes were beginning to happen, they were not experienced by that many people. As the article was published in 2009, it gives the writer time to gather and compare lots of sources in comparison to the information the writer has therefore makes the representation more objective as lots of information has been gathered, so it increases