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The 1960's
 Hippies

Hippies
Reading Level
     edHelper's suggested reading level:   grades 6 to 8
     Flesch-Kincaid grade level:   7.38

Vocabulary
     challenging words:    drugged-out, hippie, hippies, ill-fitting, integral, laid-back, loafer, unmotivated, meditation, sit-ins, footwear, finding, society, better, purpose, religion
     content words:    Middle Eastern, John Lennon, George Harrison, Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, Vietnam War, United States

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Hippies
By Jane Runyon 		  
1     If you were to ask ten different people what a hippie is, you would probably get ten different answers. The hippie generation appeared in America in the late 1960's. Hippies could generally by identified by the way they looked. The women wore long peasant type skirts and blouses. They let their long hair hang free. The men wore baggy, ill-fitting pants and, in many cases, tie-dyed shirts. Both sexes preferred sandals and being barefoot to any other kind of footwear. You would often see them carrying flowers and wearing peace signs along with their beaded jewelry.
 
2     Many young people in the late 60's were searching for a purpose to their lives. Many were drawn to Middle Eastern forms of meditation and yoga which promised to bring them "inner peace." They watched such musical idols as the Beatles search for the same thing. What started as a search by a few, turned into a movement involving thousands of young people. Their motto became "Turn on, tune in, drop out."
 
3     Unfortunately, to many hippies, turning on meant getting into drugs. They thought that marijuana would bring them peace of mind and that LSD, a hallucinogenic, would help them see the world in a better way. This is how many adults saw the hippie movement. Young, unmotivated people who dropped out of school, dropped out of society, and sat around all day taking drugs. This is also one reason the hippie generation felt that they could trust no one over the age of thirty.

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