Traditionalists wanted to live the simple life, and wanted to have a wife and kids, and mostly farm. Modernists were typically younger people, and wanted more excitement in life. This is when flappers, or women wearing short dresses and dancing, were invented. Traditionalists were people who had deep respect for long-held cultural and religious values. For them, these values
were anchors that provided order and stability to society. Modernists were people who
embraced new ideas, styles, and social trends. For them, traditional values were chains that restricted both
individual freedom and the pursuit of happiness.
As these groups clashed in the 1920s, American society became deeply divided. Defenders of traditional morality bemoaned the behavior of "flaming youth." They opposed drinking, and supported prohibition. Old-time religion faced off against modern science. The result was a kind of "culture war" that in some ways is still being fought today.
The new values, referred to as modernism, were at the core of the youth movement and challenged the old, anti-modern, values of the generation before them. While anti-modernism valued the past, the modernists put a greater emphasis on the present and the future as the youth were always looking forward to what was next and what changes were coming their way. Urban living and fast-paced city life became a prime motif of the modernist movement while the anti-modernists stayed in small communities, farms, and villages. The ideal of community life of anti-modernism was being replaced by individuality in the sense that the self was no longer bound to the community. Even time itself was being redefined by the new modernist values with a nine to five work schedule shaping the lives of many of the city dwellers while the anti-modernists held a cyclic sense of time on their farms with the set seasons and harvest times. This modernist movement was spearheaded by the growing independence, liberation, and celebration of youth during this period. Adolescence were leaving their villages and farms to pursue lives in the city and encountered a plethora of new experiences and questions they had not encountered in their anti-modernist shelters.
As these groups clashed in the 1920s, American society became deeply divided. Defenders of traditional morality bemoaned the behavior of "flaming youth." They opposed drinking, and supported prohibition. Old-time religion faced off against modern science. The result was a kind of "culture war" that in some ways is still being fought today.
The new values, referred to as modernism, were at the core of the youth movement and challenged the old, anti-modern, values of the generation before them. While anti-modernism valued the past, the modernists put a greater emphasis on the present and the future as the youth were always looking forward to what was next and what changes were coming their way. Urban living and fast-paced city life became a prime motif of the modernist movement while the anti-modernists stayed in small communities, farms, and villages. The ideal of community life of anti-modernism was being replaced by individuality in the sense that the self was no longer bound to the community. Even time itself was being redefined by the new modernist values with a nine to five work schedule shaping the lives of many of the city dwellers while the anti-modernists held a cyclic sense of time on their farms with the set seasons and harvest times. This modernist movement was spearheaded by the growing independence, liberation, and celebration of youth during this period. Adolescence were leaving their villages and farms to pursue lives in the city and encountered a plethora of new experiences and questions they had not encountered in their anti-modernist shelters.