New Left

(noun)

A range of activists, educators, agitators, and others in the 1960s and 1970s who focused their attention on marginalized identities and, eventually, identity politics.

Related Terms

Examples of New Left in the following topics:

  • Student Rebellions and the New Left

    • The New Left drew inspiration from black radicalism, particularly the Black Power movement and the left-wing Black Panther Party.
    • By 1962, the SDS had emerged as the most important of the new campus radical groups; soon it would be regarded as virtually synonymous with the New Left.
    • The media began to cover the organization and the New Left.
    • The fall of 1967 saw a great escalation of the anti-war actions of the New Left.
    • Outline the course of New Left politics, especially the Students for Democratic Society

  • A Halfway Revolution

    • The New Deal is often called the "halfway revolution," because many argue that the New Deal did not go far enough.
    • The New Deal has often been called the "halfway revolution. " Essentially, this critique of the New Deal claims that the New Deal did not go far enough in its social or economic reforms.
    • Despite the criticisms that the New Deal did not go "far enough," the New Deal was at least a "halfway" revolution, a major step for liberalism in the United States.
    • Conservatives feared the New Deal meant socialism; Roosevelt noted privately in 1934 that the "old line press harps increasingly on state socialism and demands the return to the good old days. " However, the New Deal's record also came under attack by New Left historians in the 1960s for not attacking capitalism more vigorously, nor helping blacks achieve equality.
    • In this way, it is argued that the New Deal was only a "halfway revolution. "

  • The "New World Order"

    • Bush used the term "New World Order" to try to define the nature of the post-Cold War era.
    • The term "new world order" has been used to refer to any new period of history evidencing a dramatic change in world political thought and the balance of power.
    • His formulation included an extensive list of ideas in creating a new order.
    • Various new concepts arose in the press as elements on the new order.
    • The New York Times observed that the American left was calling the new world order a "rationalization for imperial ambitions" in the Middle East, while the right rejected new security arrangements altogether and fulminated about any possibility of UN revival.

  • Political Critiques of the New Deal

    • Others saw the New Deal as a manifestation of socialism or communism.
    • The left accused Roosevelt of empowering big business while the right opposed the policies that regulated business and expanded workers' rights.
    • Roosevelt attracted as much criticism from the left as he did from the right.
    • Roosevelt's ambiguous relationship with the business, which conservatives perceived as too restrictive and focused on pro-labor initiatives while leftists as leaving too much power in the hands of business leaders, has also provoked much criticism on the left.
    • However, by 1934, he became one of the harshest critics of the New Deal.

  • In Quest of Freedom

    • On July 21, 1782, as the final British ship left Savannah, more than 5,000 African Americans left for Jamaica or St.
    • They sailed to New York, England, and Nova Scotia.
    • In New York, the British created a registry of escaped slaves, called the "Book of Negroes".
    • On January 15, 1792, 1,193 blacks left Halifax for West Africa and a new life.
    • A black soldier (left) engages in battle.

  • Colonies in Crisis

    • They arrested dominion officials as a protest against the rule of Sir Edmund Andros, the governor of the Dominion of New England.
    • Furthermore, he had infuriated Puritans in Boston by promoting the Church of England, which was disliked by many Nonconformist New England colonists.
    • Following similar frustrations against the rule and policies of James II as the Bostonians, German American merchant and militia captain Jacob Leisler seized control of the southern part of the colony of New York and ruled it from 1689 to 1691.
    • Royal authority was not restored until 1691, when English troops and a new governor were sent to New York.
    • Leisler was convicted and executed, but the revolt left the colony polarized and bitterly split into two rival factions.

  • Quebec, New York, and New Jersey

    • In the early stages of the American Revolution, battles over Quebec, New York, and New Jersey played an important role in the war.
    • A simultaneous expedition left Cambridge, Massachusetts under Benedict Arnold and traveled with great difficulty through the wilderness of Maine to Quebec City.
    • This arduous trek left Arnold's surviving troops starving and lacking in basic supplies and equipment.
    • News of the capture of New York was favorably received in London, and General Howe was awarded the Order of the Bath for his work.
    • That night, Washington stealthily moved his troops again, intending to attack the garrison Cornwallis left at Princeton.

  • Reform and Scandal: The Campaign of 1884

    • The so-called Mugwumps, reformist Republicans, left the Republican party in anger at Blaine's nomination in the 1884 presidential election.
    • The leading candidate for the nomination was New York Governor Grover Cleveland.
    • Theodore Roosevelt stunned his upper class New York City friends by supporting Blaine in 1884; by rejecting the Mugwumps, he kept alive his Republican party leadership, clearing the way for his own political aspirations.
    • New England and the Northeastern United States had been a stronghold of the Republican Party since the Civil War era, but the Mugwumps considered Blaine to be an untrustworthy and fraudulent candidate.

  • Charles Finney and the Burned-Over District

    • The term was coined in 1876 by Charles Grandison Finney, who argued that the area had been so heavily evangelized as to have no "fuel" (unconverted population) left over to "burn" (convert).
    • He led revival meetings in New York and Pennsylvania, but his greatest success occurred after he accepted a ministry in Rochester, New York, in 1830.
    • The new middle class—an outgrowth of the Industrial Revolution—embraced Finney’s message.
    • The first communal Shaker farm was established in this area of New York during this period.
    • Identify the key religious movements that emerged out of the western New York frontier

  • No Child Left Behind

    • Proposed by the Bush Administration, No Child Left Behind reformed education by setting high standards and establishing measurable goals.
    • The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) is a United States Act of Congress first proposed by the administration of George W.
    • If a school misses its AYP target for a fourth consecutive year, the school is labelled as requiring "corrective action," which might involve wholesale replacement of staff, introduction of a new curriculum, or extending the amount of time students spend in class.
    • President Bush signing the bipartisan No Child Left Behind Act at Hamilton H.S. in Hamilton, Ohio.
    • Assess the impact of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001