Project: Ephemeral Films and their significance

Research Project: Final Project: Ephemeral Films and their significance
Select at least 2 “ephemeral films” from the two online archives and report on (a) how these reflect
the context—social, economic, or political—of the time they appeared, (b) where the period(s) examined
appear in the textbooks and how that source treats the subject matter (if at all), and (c) how useful these might
be in terms of teaching a history course of modern America. We will discuss some of this in class during the
semester.
Please use this video before accessing the site.
What is an “ephemeral film?”
The word ephemeral means fleeting, transient, short-lived. These visual documents have their roots in
educating students in high school and college, or factory workers while at the plant in the cafeteria. Schools
sometime brought the various classes to watch a film into the school auditorium, or perhaps brought one or two
groups into a classroom. Their very value rests with how easily dated they are, not merely by the dress and the
language, but also the ideas presented.
Here are some examples:
“A Date with Your Family” (1950)
https://archive.org/details/0248_Date_With_Your_Family_A_E00190_19_29_54_00
“Make Mine Freedom” (1948)
https://archive.org/details/4050_Make_Mine_Freedom_01_01_10_02
“Are You Popular?” (1947)
https://archive.org/details/AreYouPo1947
“Our Changing Family” (1957)
https://archive.org/details/OurChang1957
“The All American Soap Box Derby” (1936)
https://archive.org/details/AllAmeri1936
“The Plantation System in Southern Life” (1950)
https://archive.org/details/Plantati1950
The two websites:
https://archive.org/details/ephemera
The subject matter of these videos picks up in the 1960s and goes through the next twenty years or more.
https://archive.org/details/prelinger
This collection covers a more diverse series of topics and goes back much further, into the 1930s and then into
the 1950s. Both collections have public service announcements, television commercials, along with “education”
and “informational” films (such as “Why not become a librarian?”).
Require Readings, and at least 2 sources need to cite from the following readings :
Edwards et alia., America’s History (volume 2, ninth edition) and Howard Zinn, A People’s History of the United
States. (20th anniversary edition, 2003)