The Modern Temper

In Lynn Dumenil's account of the era commonly referred to as the "roaring twenties" in The Modern Temper: American Culture and Society in the 1920s there is an intentional emphasis placed on the effort to dispel the popular notion that the new, revolutionary transformations in culture and society that took place at this time in history were direct results of the First World War. In the stead of this less insightful means of analyzing the 1920's in America by assuming that the post war era was a direct creation and consequence from the war, the author offers the suggestion that the seeds of the twenties were planted much earlier during the industrial revolution and through the effects of a culture rapidly industrializing in a capitalist society. The war period simply served to expedite the process by contributing to the economic boom that created the prosperity of the twenties, sparking the migration of the rural population of African Americans and whites into urban areas, and by increasing opportunities for women in the work force.…