American Cultural Encounters with East Asia During the Cold War

Webinar Leader

Christina Klein
Associate Professor of English, Boston College

Webinar Details

We often think of the Cold War in terms of the nuclear standoff between the United States and the Soviet Union, or the “hot” wars in Korea and Vietnam. But the Cold War had a cultural dimension as well, and books, movies, music, and painting were routinely enlisted in the struggle against communism. This webinar explores the “cultural Cold War” in America and Asia in the 1950s. How did popular literature teach Americans what was at stake in Asia? Why did the CIA help filmmakers in Hong Kong, Japan, and Korea make more entertaining films? How was photography enlisted to present America as a non-imperial global power? Join us as we explore these and other questions.