Abstract

Decades after the massive student protest movements that consumed much of the world, the 1960s remain a significant subject of scholarly inquiry. While important work has been done regarding radical activism in the United States and Western Europe, events in what is today known as the Global South—Asia, Africa, and Latin America—have yet to receive the attention they deserve. This volume inserts the Third World into the study of the 1960s by examining the local and international articulations of youth protest in various geographical, social, and cultural arenas. Rejecting the notion that the Third World existed on the periphery, it situates the events of the 1960s in a more inclusive context, building a richer, more nuanced understanding of the era that better reflects the dynamism of the period.

Samantha Christiansen is an Assistant Professor of History and Director of Women's Studies at Marywood University.  She received her Ph.D. in History from Northeastern University and is a specialist in South Asian and World History with an interest in social movements, urban history and gender.

“Historians of the burgeoning field of the global 1960s will welcome the contributions the volume makes.” • Choice

“The wide ranging analytical span offered by this volume, is most gratifying, resulting in a truly successful global historical undertaking.” • Neue Politische Literatur

“Essential reading for all scholars of the global 1960s. Christiansen and Scarlett have brought together an extraordinary group of contributors. They challenge readers to think about the vector and velocity of political change in the long Sixties era by grounding their work in the fierce struggles for freedom in what was once called 'the Third World'.” • David Farber, Temple University

“[A]n exciting contribution to the ongoing globalization of the historical conception of ‘1968.’ The global South has been almost invisible in the historical scholarship on this vital topic up to now, and this volume marks an important step forward in the rectification of that imbalance. The individual essays make for stimulating reading, and fairly burst with new information and insights from histories around the world, histories whose urgency has not dimmed with the passage of time.” • Doug Rossinow, author of Visions of Progress: The Left-Liberal Tradition in America

“The editors and the authors are to be commended for creating this fascinating and important volume. By giving sustained attention to the 1960s in the so-called ‘Third World,’ while exploring the status of the very idea of the ‘Third World’ internationally, the book both expands and unsettles common understandings of the ‘global Sixties.’ The individual essays bring to light local conflicts and struggles often excluded from narratives of the era, while illuminating the relationship between national, transnational, and international contexts. It is a vital addition to the accumulating body of knowledge on the 1960s and the means by which the world has become increasingly interconnected.” • Jeremy Varon, The New School for Social Research, New York

Zachary Scarlett is an Assistant Professor of History at Butler University. He received his Ph.D. from Northeastern University. Zachary focuses on modern Chinese history, with a specific interest in Maoist society. His current project examines the ways in which the Global Sixties was understood in Maoist China during the Cultural Revolution.