the ethnic term “black”
“A . . . significant example of language turnover can be seen in the sudden shift of meaning associated with the ethnic term “black.” For years, dark-skinned Americans regarded the term as racist. Liberal whites dutifully taught their children to use the term “Negro” and to capitalize the “N.” Shortly after Stokely Carmichael proclaimed the doctrine of Black Power in Greenwood, Mississippi in June, 1966, however, “black” became a term of pride among both blacks and whites in the movement for racial justice. Caught off guard, liberal whites went through a period of confusion, uncertain as to whether to use Negro or black. Black was quickly legitimated when the mass media adopted the new meaning. Within a few months, black was “in,” Negro “out.”
—Alvin Toffler, Future Shock, 1970.
Every architect wants his own shade of green
“There are ten times the new styles and colors there were a decade ago. Every architect wants his own shade of green.”
—John A. Saunders, president of General Fireproofing Company, an office supply manufacturer, as quoted by Alvin Toffler in Future Shock, 1970.
old-line “white shoe” firms
“Wall Street was, in fact, one big White Anglo-Saxon Protestant subcult, and its members did tend to go to the same schools, join the same clubs, engage in the same sports (tennis, golf and squash), attend the same churches (Presbyterian and Episcopalian), and vote for the same party (Republican). . . .
In investment banking the old conservative WASP grouping still lingers on. There are still some old-line “white shoe” firms of which it is said ‘They’ll have a black partner before they hire a Jew.’”
—Alvin Toffler, Future Shock, 1970.
a corporate merger
“Out of . . . two sources, the beat subcult of the mid-fifties and the “acid” subcult of the early sixties, sprang a larger group—a new subcult that might be described as a corporate merger of the two: the hippie movement. Blending the blue jeans of the beats with the beads and bangles of the acid crowd, the hippies became the newest and most hotly publicized subcult on the American scene.”
—Alvin Toffler, Future Shock, 1970.
“beats” or “beatniks”
“In the mid-fifties, a small group of writers, artists and assorted hangers-on coalesced in San Fransisco and around Carmel and Big Sur on the California coast. Quicly dubbed “beats” or “beatniks,” they pieced together a distinctive way of life.
Its most conscpicuous elements were the glorification of poverty—jeans, sandals, pads and hovels; a predilection for Negro jazz and jargon; an interest in Eastern mysticism and French existentialism; and a general antagonism to technologically based society.
—Alvin Toffler, Future Shock, 1970.
Why do the motorcyclists wear black jackets?
“Why do the motorcyclists wear black jackets? Why not brown or blue? Why do executives in America prefer attach? cases, rather than the traditional briefcase? It is as though they were following some model, trying to attain some ideal laid down from above.”
—Alvin Toffler, Future Shock, 1970.
It was a white house and the shutters were painted red
“After my mother’s death, her maid became my nurse. . . . I think my father had a romantic mind. He took it into his head to build a house to live in during the summer. He bought a piece of land on the top of a hill at Suresnes. . . . It was to be like a villa on the Bosphorous and on the top floor it was surrounded by loggias. . . . It was a white house and the shutters were painted red. The garden was laid out. The rooms were furnished and then my father died.”
—Sommerset Maugham, from his biography, The Summing Up, as quoted by Alvin Toffler in Future Shock, 1970.
a flash of color
“Significantly, when some new set of stimuli hits us, both body and brain know almost instantly that they are new. The change may be no more than a flash of color seen out of the corner of an eye. . . .
The change in stimuli triggers what experimental psychologists call an “orientation response,”. . . a complex, even massive bodily operation. The pupils of the eyes dilate. Photochemical changes occur in the retina. . . . We involuntarily use our muscles to direct our sense organs toward the incoming stimuli—we lean toward the sound, for example, or squint our eyes to see better. Our general muscle tone rises. There are changes in our pattern of brain waves. Our fingers and toes grow cold as the veins and arteries in them constrict. Our palms sweat. blood rushes to the head. Our breathing and heart rate alter.
Under certian circumstances, we may do all of this—and more—in a very obvious fashion, exhibiting what has been called the “startle reaction.” But even when we are unaware of what is going on, these changes take place every time we perceive novelty in our environment.”
—Alvin Toffler, Future Shock, 1970.
thrift-store gowns and kooky hats
“When young people don outlandish costumes, thrift-store gowns and kooky hats, they touch off a subtle fear among the “straights” in society because they announce, by their clothing, that their behavior is likely to be unpredictable. The strength of their attachment to their own subculture, at the same time, derives from the fact that within the group, unpredictability is reduced. They can make better predictions about the behavior of their peers and subcult colleagues than about the outside world.”
—Alvin Toffler, from a footnote to Future Shock, 1970.
the English word lesbian
“Sappho is best known for erotic poety, for she expressed her love frankly and without shame. She was bisexual, and much of her poetry deals with her homosexual love affairs. In one of her poems she remembers the words of her lover:
Sappho, if you do not come out,
I swear, I will love you no more.
O rise and free your lovely strength
From the bed and shine upon us.
Lifting off your Chian nightgown, and
Like a pure lily by a spring,
Bathe in the water.
In antiquity Sappho’s name became linked with female homosexual love. Today the English word lesbian is derived from Sappho’s island home.”
—McKay, Hill and Buckler, A History of Western Society, sixth edition, 1999. Quoting from Sappho by W. Barnstable, 1965.