A collection of essays encompassing a wide variety of topics, people, and events that embodied the Jazz Age, both familiar and obscure.

This volume in ABC-CLIO’s social history series, People and Perspectives, looks at one of the most vibrant eras in U.S. history, a decade when American life was utterly transformed, often veering from freewheeling to fearful, from liberated to repressed.

What did it mean to live through the Jazz Age? To answer this and other important questions, the volume broadens the spotlight from famous figures to cover everyday citizens whose lives were impacted by the times, including women and children, African Americans, rural Americans, immigrants, artists, and more. Chapters explore a wide range of topics beyond the music that came to symbolize the era, such as marriage, religion, consumerism, art and literature, fashion, the workplace, and more-the full cultural landscape of an extraordinary, if short-lived, moment in the life of a nation.

Written by experts from a variety of fields including history, music, literature, African American studies, and religious studies

Includes an extensive chronology of the defining moments of the Jazz Age from the worlds of politics, society and culture, the arts, business, and more