Description
Book SynopsisRestricted to the shorthand of ‘sex, drugs, and rock’n' roll’, the counterculture would seem to be a brief, vibrant stretch of the 1960s. But the American counterculture, as this book clearly demonstrates, was far more than a historical blip and its impact continues to resonate.
Trade ReviewWith great clarity, precision, and impeccable documentation, Damon R. Bach has crafted an important corrective to the myths, stereotypes, and long-held misconceptions about the sixties counterculture. Impressive in its scope and depth,
The American Counterculture offers a highly accessible account of a movement that encompassed both hippies and allied cultural dissidents, interacted with other social movements of the period, extended from the coasts to the heartland, inhabited both rural and urban spaces, and shifted its orientation from cultural change to engagement with a wide range of political concerns. Moving beyond monolithic, static accounts of 'hippies,' the book brings to life a movement that was continually evolving in response to other social and political currents, lasted well beyond the sixties, and left an indelible imprint on American society. Compelling and original, this book will no doubt attract the interest of scholars and students as well as the general public." —Gretchen Lemke-Santangelo, author of
Daughters of Aquarius: Women of the Sixties Counterculture"
The American Counterculture offers a sweeping synthesis of an important national story. With brisk pacing and a wide geographical reach, Damon Bach's book is especially valuable for its analysis of the relationship between cultural hippies and the New Left activists and the incontrovertible evidence it provides that the counterculture was not simply a bicoastal movement; it truly spread across the entire nation and made a lasting impact on American culture and politics. This is 'a trip' worth taking." —Sherry L. Smith, author of
Hippies, Indians and the Fight for Red Power"
The American Counterculture is like a wild road trip around the United States of the Long Sixties, with stops at familiar haunts like Haight-Ashbury and the Lower East Side as well as hidden hideaways like Portland’s Lair Hill Park, Lawrence’s Strawberry Fields head shop, and the offices of Atlanta’s
Great Speckled Bird. Bach reminds us of how pervasive the counterculture became over its brief, brilliant run, and he brings a motley array of voices and sources to the project. This is an essential book for anyone wanting to understand the full scope of sixties-era youth culture." —Blake Slonecker, author of
A New Dawn for the New Left: Liberation News Service, Montague Farm, and the Long Sixties"In 2017, at a conference on the 1967 Summer of Love, historians of the 1960s revisited San Francisco and lamented that no one had written the ‘big book’ on the counterculture, a book that takes readers beyond the clichÉs of sex, drugs, and rock ’n’ roll and examines the rise, development, demise, and legacies of the hippies. They wanted a book based on hippie documents that investigates the counterculture's relations with other movements of the 1960s, from the New Left to the antiwar movement to ecology to women’s liberation. Good news readers—this is it! Damon Bach’s
American Counterculture: A History of Hippies and Cultural Dissidents is a tour de force that will become the go-to book that examines—and explains—the hippies." —Terry H. Anderson, author of
The Movement and the Sixties: Protest in America from Greensboro to Wounded Knee
