The Cold War era in America is commonly remembered as a time of fear due to both a potential war with Soviet Russia, and of potential Communist threats from within America's boarders. To illustrate this sense of fear, I chose to create a word cloud from Senator Joseph McCarthy's speech where he detailed the communists who had infiltrated the State Department. It was through this and other speeches, that he was able produce fear within the government and throughout the nation, known as the Red Scare.[1] The word cloud originally contained over one hundred of the most commonly used words in McCarthy's speech. I chose to reduce the number of words to seventy five, which altered to image in a more sinister way. The words as communist, people, state, and time became bolder. The size of these words also create a sense of urgency, which reflects the urgency to protect the nation from a communist threat. The colors chosen for this word cloud also help to portray the Cold War era. The various shades of red reflect the "red scare" that many feared, while the blues can be representative of both America and/or a feeling of coldness. The gray background gives the whole image a somber feeling, which is reflective of the feelings of fear of communist spies. It also represents the fear of being falsely accused of communism, which was common during the Red Scare period of the Cold War.
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Word Cloud of Joseph McCarthy's speech
"Communists in the State Department" 1950
The second word cloud was created with Governor of Illinois, Adlai Stevenson's speech which he had given to Smith College (an all female school) in 1955. In this speech Stevenson encouraged the graduating class to become wives and mothers, who would ensure that America's youth and men would not stray towards communism and maintain Western values (instead of either furthering their education or utilizing their skills outside of the home).[2] Unlike the speech that McCarthy had given in 1950, Stevenson's speech was meant to invoke duty and purpose, instead of fear and dread. To represent this sentiment the colors used are almost cheerful, and the font is slightly collegiate. The blues and yellows in this word cloud represent Smith College's colors, as apposed to the blues in the previous image which reflected a colder style.The yellow background emphasizes the words, but in a less dramatic way than the McCarthy cloud. This softer contrast between the background and the image emphasizes less fearful emotions that the previous speech sparked during the Cold War. The one constant between the two clouds is the use of the color red. Here, like in the previous visual, the red is meant to represent the fear of communism.
The words that stood out the most in this image were society, Western, now, and man. Although these words seem to promote a sense of urgency, when viewed in this format it is not the same type of urgency that could be felt in the McCarthy cloud. Instead of fear fueling these words and urgency, it is more of a sense of duty and confidence. This difference in visualization help to provide added understandings of the Cold War period, by representing both the fear that many felt and the push towards national duty.
These visualizations provide an added element of understanding and interpretation to the Cold War historical narrative. They both help to encourage added sentiment and engagement between the audience and historical narrative, that may not be fully achieved through the reading of literature alone. However, it should be noted that the utilization of this form of visualization can promote one's own historical bias because of the many ways in which the data can be manipulated, and change the original emphasis of the content.
[1] McCarthy, Joseph. http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/disp_textbook.cfm?smtID=3&psid=3633
[2] Stevenson, Adlai. http://coursesa.matrix.msu.edu/~hst306/documents/stevenson.html
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