Red War on the Family

By Erica J. Ryan,

Book cover of Red War on the Family: Sex, Gender, and Americanism in the First Red Scare

Book description

In the 1920s, cultural and political reactions to the Red Scare in America contributed to a marked shift in the way Americans thought about sexuality, womanhood, manhood, and family life. The Russian Revolution prompted anxious Americans sensing a threat to social order to position heterosexuality, monogamy, and the family as…

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Why read it?

1 author picked Red War on the Family as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

The Russian Revolution upended global politics just as women’s suffrage movements, including in the United States, were doing so as well. Modern culture and its impact on gender roles and sexuality come together with panic over revolution in Ryan’s book to link anti-feminism with anti-radicalism as core to the dynamics of the Red Scare and defining ‘Americanism’ for the 1920s. Her novel insights explain how the changing identity of the American home and family escalated a conservative politics tied to anti-communism.

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