The Catcher in the Rye

1. The Catcher in the Rye By:J.D Salinger

2. Teens Life in the 1940's During the 1940's, American teens separated themselves from adults. They had their own dance; the jitterbug. They had their own style; saddle shoes, oversized multi-print skirts, zoot suits, and wide brimmed hats. They went to clubs that served oversized menus and soda. At the clubs, they would listen to the greats of their time; Duke Ellington, Glenn Miller, Frank Sinatra, Louis Armstrong. They would go dancing in ballrooms, go for a walk outside, and just enjoy life. Also going on in the 1940’s was the holocaust. Teens were most likely to lose a parent or a loved one during the 1940’s. This could change the personality of the teen from not having there brother or dad there anymore.

3. World War II There were scrap (metal) drives, war bond drives and stamps for food or shoes. Young boys with their wagons and teenagers would go from house-to-house collecting aluminum of any sort or any other metals. The average gasoline ration was 3 gallons a week; the yearly butter ration was 12 lbs. per person 26% less than normal the yearly limit for canned goods 33 lbs., 13 lbs. under usual consumption levels; and people could buy only 3 new pairs of shoes a year. Even with war pending teenagers were still in an era of innocence and family values. Teenagers had to deal with the war during the 1940’s. World War II was going on during the 1940’s. Men and boys that were old enough were sent off to war and the money wasn’t good. The money was very low from using it in the war. A lot of the clothes and toys were handy downs.

4. No Sex, Just Marriage In the 40s girls could date at 16, the parents actually met the young man, he'd better have good manners, and bring their daughter home on time. Teenagers never lived with their boyfriends, but some girls who became unwed mothers during this time were either whisked away to homes for single mothers or sent off to a relatives home in another town or State. Girls that smoked, or had sex got a bad reputation and were classified as "easy”. Many young woman thought it was acceptable to smoke like Bette Davis and other actors who were seen smoking on the silver screen. If a teenage girl were to get pregnant in the forties she had two options. Option one: She could have a secret abortion. Or option two: She would have to get married to the guy who got her pregnant. Teenagers were most likely to get married before they had sex back in the 1940’s. DON’T BE A TEEN MOM!!

5. After school duties and family life The families were like in the movies. Stay at home mom, working father, two children, and maybe a dog. Families actually sat down for dinner and Sundays were a day of rest for the families to spend quality time with each other. After school in the 1940s a teenager would go home, change clothes and go to work. If your family was poor, you would work hard after school or you did not even get to go to school, but worked all day and all of your earnings would go to the family. Girls would often work at the YMCA as a locker room attendant, teaching swimming, working at a pizza place, working in warehouses or as waitress. There were delivery boys at the fish market, soda jerks and ushers in theaters. This gave teenagers many job opportunities.

6. Education In the 1940s you'd see girls making dresses, hats, learning to do laundry in the correct way and beauty culture and boys trained hard in physical education (football as well) which really kept the boys in shape for war. Schools offered vocational and commercial courses from dress-making to bookkeeping, because young people and their parents choose school over work only if it served a practical purpose. Growing numbers of young people soon filled technical schools. Schools taught lessons in family life, hygiene and health. More than half of the population of the U.S. had completed no more than 8th grade. In 1945 50% of 17 year olds were high school graduates.

7. Music Teens in the 1940’s had a famous dance called the Jitterbug! Jitterbug http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbaNYWkQYYA

8. The Greats of the 1940s Duke Ellington Frank Sinatra Glenn Miller Louis Armstrong

9. Style Zoot Suit! Saddle shoe! Multi print skirts! Wide brimmed hat!

10. Why the book was banned!? Reasons and where Catcher in the Rye was banned from….. “In 1960, school administrators at a high school in Tulsa, Okla., fired an English teacher for assigning the book to an 11th grade class.” “the book remained off the required reading list.” “Another community in Columbus, Ohio, deemed the book "anti-white" and formed a delegation to have it banned from local schools.” “One library banned it for violating codes on "excess vulgar language, sexual scenes, things concerning moral issues, excessive violence, and anything dealing with the occult." Salinger once said, "Some of my best friends are children. In fact, all my best friends are children. It's almost unbearable for me to realize that my book will be kept on a shelf out of their reach." “Literary critics have both hailed and assailed the novel, which broke the mold with its focus on character development rather than plot.” “In 1980, 25-year-old Mark David Chapman shot Beatles legend John Lennon in front of his Manhattan home and later gave the book to police as an explanation for why he did it.” (more on next slide)

11. Why the book was banned?! “One of the major reasons The Catcher in the Rye is banned in from some school libraries is because of the sexual content and offensive language used.” “parents are opposed to the book being a part of the curriculum for high school students.” “The sexual content in the book cannot be any worse than what teenagers are seeing on television shows and in music videos.”“no parent wants their child being subjected to obscene language, especially in the classroom, but the language is not something the teenagers have not heard before.” “There are 224 instances where obscene language has been used in the book, with a few occurrences being the ‘F-word.’" “This use of obscene language should not allow a book to be banned, especially since most of the words in the book have become everyday words for many people in our society.” (more on next slide)

12. Why the book was banned?! In 1960 a teacher was fired for assigning the novel in class; he was later reinstated. Between 1961 and 1982, The Catcher in the Rye was the most censored book in high schools and libraries in the United States. In 1981, it was both the most censored book and the second most taught book in public schools in the United States. According to the American Library Association, The Catcher in the Rye was the tenth most frequently challenged book from 1990–1999. It was one of the ten most challenged books of 2005 and although it has been off the list for three years, it has reappeared in the list of most challenged books of 2009. The challenges generally begin with vulgar language, citing the novel's use of words like fuck and goddamn, with more general reasons including sexual references, blasphemy, undermining of family values and moral codes, Holden's being a poor role model, encouragement of rebellion, and promotion of drinking, smoking, lying, and promiscuity. Often, the challengers have been unfamiliar with the plot itself. Shelley Keller-Gage, a high school teacher who faced objections after assigning the novel in her class, noted that the challengers "are being just like Holden... They are trying to be catchers in the rye." A reverse effect has been that this incident caused people to put themselves on the waiting list to borrow the novel, when there were none before. (more on next slide)

13. Why the book was banned?! Mark David Chapman's shooting of John Lennon (Chapman was arrested with a copy of the book), John Hinckley, Jr.'s assassination attempt on Ronald Reagan, Robert John Bardo's shooting of Rebecca Schaeffer, and other murders have also been associated with the novel. In 2009, Salinger successfully sued to stop the U.S. publication of a novel that presents Holden Caulfield as an old man. The novel's author, Fredrik Colting, commented, "call me an ignorant Swede, but the last thing I thought possible in the U.S. was that you banned books." The issue is complicated by the nature of Colting's book, 60 Years Later: Coming Through the Rye, which has been compared to fan fiction. Although commonly not authorized by writers, no legal action is usually taken against fan fiction since it is rarely published commercially and thus involves no profit. Colting, however, has published his book commercially. Unauthorized fan fiction on The Catcher in the Rye has existed on the Internet for years without any legal action taken by Salinger.

14. Bibliography (http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1842832_1842838_1845068,00.html) http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/162077/banned_book_the_catcher_in_the_rye.html) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Catcher_in_the_Rye#Controversy) http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_was_life_like_for_a_teenager_in_the_1940s http://farm1.static.flickr.com/179/453143709_e0ad1e700a.jpg . http://www.bookrags.com/essay-2006/2/12/18199/4576 http://kclibrary.lonestar.edu/decade40.html http://kclibrary.lonestar.edu/decade40.html http://www.wgeneration.com/1940.html http://www.newberry.k12.sc.us/mchs/40%27s%20Slang.htm