Serge Reggiani est le premier invité de Philippe Bouvard, qui présente RTL Non-stop sur la Galiote, un bateau-mouche sillonant la Seine.

The United States Senate votes down the Supreme Court nomination of Clement Haynsworth, the first such rejection since 1930.

Travel, domestic and international, was a prominent feature of hippie culture, becoming (in this communal process) an extension of friendship. School busses similar to Ken Kesey’s Furthur, or the iconic VW bus, were popular because groups of friends could travel on the cheap. The VW Bus became known as a counterculture and hippie symbol, and many buses were repainted with graphics and custom paint jobs - these were predecessors to the modern-day art car. A peace symbol often replaced the Volkswagen logo. Many hippies favored hitchhiking as a primary mode of transport because it was economical, environmentally friendly, and a way to meet new people.

 

Hippies tended to travel light and could pick up and go wherever the action was at any time; whether at a “love-in” on Mount Tamalpais near San Francisco, a demonstration against the Vietnam War in Berkeley, one of Ken Kesey’s “Acid Tests”, or if the “vibe” wasn’t right and a change of scene was desired, hippies were mobile at a moment’s notice. Pre-planning was eschewed as hippies were happy to put a few clothes in a backpack, stick out their thumbs and hitchhike anywhere. Hippies seldom worried whether they had money, hotel reservations or any of the other standard accoutrements of travel. Hippie households welcomed overnight guests on an impromptu basis, and the reciprocal nature of the lifestyle permitted freedom of movement. People generally cooperated to meet each other’s needs in ways that became less common after the early 1970s.” This way of life is still seen among the Rainbow Family groups, new age travellers and New Zealand’s housetruckers. A derivative of this free-flow style of travel were hippie trucks and buses, hand-crafted mobile houses built on truck or bus chassis to facilitate a nomadic lifestyle. Some of these mobile gypsy houses were quite elaborate with beds, toilets, showers and cooking facilities.

On the West Coast, a unique lifestyle developed around the Renaissance Faires that Phyllis and Ron Patterson first organized in 1963.

During the summer and fall months, entire families traveled together in their trucks and buses, parked at Renaissance Pleasure Faire sites in Southern and Northern California, worked their crafts during the week, and donned Elizabethan costume for weekend performances and to attend booths where handmade goods were sold to the public.

The sheer number of young people living at the time made for unprecedented travel opportunities to special happenings. The peak experience of this type was the Woodstock Festival near Bethel, New York, from August 15 to 19, 1969, which drew over 500,000 people.

One travel experience, undertaken by hundreds of thousands of hippies between 1969-1971, was the Hippie trail overland route to India. Carrying little or no luggage, and with small amounts of cash, almost all followed the same route, hitch-hiking across Europe to Athens and on to Istanbul, then by train through central Turkey via Erzurum, continuing by bus into Iran, via Tabriz and Tehran to Mashad, across the Afghan border into Herat, through southern Afghanistan via Kandahar to Kabul, over the Khyber Pass into Pakistan, via Rawalpindi and Lahore to the Indian frontier. Once in India, hippies went to many different destinations but gathered in large numbers on the beaches of Goa, or crossed the border into Nepal to spend months in Kathmandu. In Kathmandu, most of the hippies hung out in tranquil surrounding of a place called Freak Street (Nepal Bhasa: Jhoo Chhen) which still exists near Kathmandu Durbar Square.

 

La route

« La route des hippies » est une expression utilisée pour évoquer les voyages entrepris par cette génération des années 1960, principalement vers l’Europe et l’Asie. Le voyage se faisait fréquemment par bus ou en auto-stop, les étapes obligées étaient Amsterdam, Londres et les destinations Goa (Inde), Katmandou (Népal) mais aussi la Turquie et l’Iran. Un des objectifs déclarés de ces voyages était la « quête de soi » ou « la recherche de Dieu » mais également la recherche de toutes nouvelles expériences. Des ouvrages comme Sur la route de Jack Kerouac ont contribué au mythe de « la route ».

 

 

 

Hippies sought to free themselves from societal restrictions, choose their own way, and find new meaning in life. One expression of hippie independence from societal norms was found in their standard of dress and grooming, which made hippies instantly recognizable to one another, and served as a visual symbol of their respect for individual rights. Through their appearance, hippies declared their willingness to question authority, and distanced themselves from the “straight” and “square” that is to say conformists segments of society.

At the same time, many thoughtful “hippies” distanced themselves from the very idea that the way a person dresses could be a reliable signal of who he was, especially after members of the criminal underground such as Charles Manson began to adopt hippie customs for a brief time starting in 1968, and also after plainclothes policemen started to dress “like hippies” in order to harass members of the counter-culture. Frank Zappa admonished his audience that “we all wear a uniform”: the San Francisco clown/hippie Wavy Gravy said in 1987 that he could still see fellow-feeling in the eyes of Market Street businessman who’d dressed conventionally to survive.

As in the beat movement preceding them, and the punk movement that followed soon after, hippie symbols and iconography were purposely borrowed from either “low” or “primitive” cultures, with hippie fashion reflecting a disorderly, often vagrant style. As with other adolescent, white middle-class movements, deviant behavior of the hippies involved challenging the prevailing gender differences of their time: both men and women in the hippie movement wore jeans and maintained long hair, and both genders wore sandals or went barefoot. Men often wore beards, while women wore little or no makeup, with many going braless. Hippies often chose brightly colored clothing and wore unusual styles, such as bell-bottom pants, vests, tie-dyed garments, dashikis, peasant blouses, and long, full skirts; non-Western inspired clothing with Native American, Asia, Indian, African and Latin American motifs were also popular. Much of hippie clothing was self-made in defiance of corporate culture, and hippies often purchased their clothes from flea markets and second-hand shops. Favored accessories for both men and women included Native American jewelry, head scarves, headbands and long beaded necklaces. Hippie homes, vehicles and other possessions were often decorated with psychedelic art.

L’esthétique hippie

En partie par rébellion contre les usages, les hippie portaient les cheveux longs, pour les hommes comme pour les femmes. Ces dernières les portant généralement défaits, sans aucun apprêt. La liberté du corps (Body freedom) est complémentaire à la liberté de l’esprit que le mouvement hippie prône. Les relations sexuelles dites “libres” ainsi que le naturisme sont des valeurs qui sont mises en avant dans leurs mode de vie.

Les vêtements se voulaient choquants pour une époque où les tenues étaient assez uniformisées et sombres. Leurs pantalons étaient à « pattes d’éléphants », style lancé par les hippies californiens et l’influence de l’Orient leur avait donné le goût des sandales, des tuniques indiennes avec des motifs très fleuris et colorés, des gilets afghans et du patchouli(voir notre article sur le patchouli!!). Ils portaient de petites lunettes rondes, des bandeaux dans les cheveux, des colliers et des bracelets de perles. Ils pouvaient tout aussi bien être nus quand la situation le permettait. Le blue-jeans est également un vêtement emblématique de la génération hippie, il est souvent porté peint, brodé, cousu, couvert de coquillages, de strass, de bijoux, de fleurs, et toujours à  pattes d’éléphant.

Daniel Cohn-Bendit est refoulé vers l’Allemagne.

Grève de la faim de treize personnes pour protester contre la présence d’huissier du rectorat.

Golda Meir devient premier ministre d’Israël.

By the 1970s, the 1960s zeitgeist that had spawned hippie culture seemed to be on the wane. The events at Altamont shocked many Americans, including those who had strongly identified with hippie culture. Another shock came in the form of the Sharon Tate and Leno and Rosemary LaBianca murders committed in August 1969 by Charles Manson and his “family” of followers. Nevertheless, the turbulent political atmosphere that featured the bombing of Cambodia and shootings by National Guardsmen at Jackson State University and Kent State University still brought people together. These shootings inspired the May 1970 song by Quicksilver Messenger Service “What About Me?”, where they sang, “You keep adding to my numbers as you shoot my people down”, as well as Neil Young’s “Ohio”, recorded by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young.

Much of hippie style had been integrated into mainstream American society by the early 1970s. Large rock concerts that originated with the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival and the 1968 Isle of Wight Festival became the norm. In the mid-1970s, with the end of the draft and the Vietnam War, a renewal of patriotic sentiment associated with the approach of the United States Bicentennial and the emergence of punk in London and New York, the mainstream media lost interest in the hippie counterculture. Acid rock gave way to heavy metal, disco, and punk rock.

Starting in the late 1960s, some working class skinheads have attacked hippies. Hippies were also villified and sometimes attacked by punks, revivalist mods, greasers, football casuals, Teddy boys and members of other youth cultures in the 1970s and 1980s. Hippie ideals were a marked influence on anarcho-punk and some post-punk youth cultures, such as the second summer of love.

While many hippies made a long-term commitment to the lifestyle, some younger people argue that hippies “sold out” during the 1980s and became part of the materialist, consumer culture. Although not as visible as it once was, hippie culture has never died out completely: hippies and neo-hippies can still be found on college campuses, on communes, and at gatherings and festivals. Many embrace the hippie values of peace, love, and community, and hippies may still be found in bohemian enclaves around the world.

 

On January 14, 1967, the outdoor Human Be-In organized by Michael Bowen helped to popularise hippie culture across the United

States, with 20,000 hippies gathering in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park. On March 26, Lou Reed, Edie Sedgwick and 10,000 hippies came together in Manhattan for the Central Park Be-In on Easter Sunday. The Monterey Pop Festival from June 16 to June 18 introduced the rock music of the counterculture to a wide audience and marked the start of the “Summer of Love.” Scott McKenzie’s rendition of John Phillips’ song, “San Francisco”, became a hit in the United States and Europe. The lyrics, “If you’re going to San Francisco, be sure to wear some flowers in your hair”, inspired thousands of young people from all over the world to travel to San Francisco, sometimes wearing flowers in their hair and distributing flowers to passersby, earning them the name, “Flower Children.” Bands like the Grateful Dead, Big Brother and the Holding Company (with Janis Joplin), and Jefferson Airplane continued to live in the Haight, but by the end of the summer, the incessant media coverage led the Diggers to declare the “death” of the hippie with a parade. According to the late poet Susan ‘Stormi’ Chambless, the hippies buried an effigy of a hippie in the Panhandle to demonstrate the end of her reign.

Regarding this period of history, the July 7, 1967, Time magazine featured a cover story entitled, “The Hippies: The Philosophy of a Subculture.” The article described the guidelines of the hippie code: “Do your own thing, wherever you have to do it and whenever you want. Drop out. Leave society as you have known it. Leave it utterly. Blow the mind of every straight person you can reach. Turn them on, if not to drugs, then to beauty, love, honesty, fun.” It is estimated that around 100,000 people traveled to San Francisco in the summer of 1967. The media was right behind them, casting a spotlight on the Haight-Ashbury district and popularizing the “hippie” label. With this increased attention, hippies found support for their ideals of love and peace but were also criticized for their anti-work, pro-drug, and permissive ethos.

By the end of the summer, the Haight-Ashbury scene had deteriorated. The neighborhood could not accommodate the influx of crowds (mostly naive youngsters) with no place to live. Many took to living on the street, panhandling and drug-dealing. There were problems with malnourishment, disease, and drug addiction. Crime and violence skyrocketed. By the end of 1967, many of the hippies and musicians who initiated the Summer of Love had moved on. Misgivings about the hippie culture, particularly with regard to drug abuse and lenient morality, fueled the moral panics of the late 1960s.

L’expression Summer of Love (Été de l’amour) désigne l’été 1967, et plus particulièrement les événements qui se déroulèrent d’abord dans le quartier de Haight-Ashbury, à San Francisco, où des milliers de jeunes du monde entier se réunirent librement pour une nouvelle expérience sociale, faisant ainsi découvrir au public la culture hippie.

 

On considère généralement que le Summer of Love a commencé avec le rassemblement du Human Be-In au Golden Gate Park, le 14 janvier de cette année. L’importance de cet événement a suscité l’intérêt des mass média pour la contreculture hippie qui fleurissait dans le Haight-Ashbury. Le mouvement était nourri par les propres médias de la contreculture, particulièrement le San Francisco Oracle, dont le lectorat global atteignit un pic d’un demi-million de personnes cette année-là. Le théâtre de rue et l’activisme des collectifs the Diggers avait aussi attiré l’attention médiatique.
Les étudiants des colleges et high schools commencèrent à arriver à Haight-Ashbury (Californie) durant leurs vacances de printemps 1967. Les dirigeants de la municipalité, déterminés à arrêter l’afflux de jeunes gens que leurs écoles avaient laissé libres pour l’été attiraient davantage l’attention sur l’évènement malgré eux. Une série d’articles d’actualité dans les journaux locaux alerta les médias nationaux sur le mouvement hippie grandissant. Les dirigeants de la communauté de Haight y répondirent en formant le Council of the Summer of Love, donnant à un mouvement créé par le bouche-à-oreille un nom officiel.

 

Pour l’occasion, John Phillips, du groupe The Mamas & The Papas prit vingt minutes pour écrire les paroles de la chanson San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair) :

« If you’re going to San Francisco,
be sure to wear some flowers in your hair…
If you’re going to San Francisco,
Summertime will be a love-in there. »

L’interprétation de cette chanson par Scott McKenzie fut diffusée en mai 1967. Elle devait à l’origine promouvoir le festival international de musique pop de Monterey au mois de juin, le premier grand festival de rock dans le monde, auquel assistèrent plus de 200 000 personnes. San Francisco devint rapidement un tube, transcendant ainsi son objectif de départ.

Les Beatles et leur évolution sur le plan personnel et artistique ont également joué un rôle dans la portée qu’a eu le Summer of Love. L’album Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band sortit le 1^er juin 1967 en Europe et un jour plus tard aux États-Unis. Par ses influences psychédéliques, ses instruments indiens, sa pochette aux couleurs vives, l’album synthétisait l’essence même du Summer of Love.

Les Beatles ont alors dépassé leur image de “Gentils garçons”, et le 25 juin 1967, leur chanson “All You Need Is Love”, écoutée dans le monde entier, insistait sur les idéaux d’amour, de paix et d’unité véhiculés par la contre-culture.

Durant l’été, pas moins de 100 000 jeunes originaires du monde entier ont convergé dans le quartier d’Haight-Ashbury, à San Francisco, à Berkeley, et dans d’autres villes de la région de San Francisco, pour se joindre à une version populaire de l’expérience hippie. Dans le Golden Gate Park, on pouvait disposer de nourriture gratuite, de drogues gratuites et d’amour libre. Un hôpital gratuit (toujours en fonction) a été installé pour les besoins médicaux, et un magasin gratuit offrait les nécessités de base à ceux qui en avaient besoin.

Le Summer of Love a attiré diverses catégories sociales : des adolescents et des étudiants attirés par leurs pairs et séduits à l’idée de rejoindre une expérience utopique, des classes moyennes en vacances qui venaient en touristes, et même des militaires venant des casernes alentours pour y faire la fête. L’afflux massif de nouveaux arrivants a commencé à poser des problèmes. Le quartier ne pouvait loger tant de monde, et les lieux se détérioraient rapidement. Le quartier souffrait de surpopulation, problèmes de logement, faim, problèmes de drogues et hausse de la criminalité. Nombreux sont ceux qui ont simplement jeté l’éponge et sont retournés à leurs études. Mais quand les dernières recrues, les Flower Children (Enfants-fleurs) retournèrent chez eux, ils apportèrent de nouvelles idées, de nouveaux idéaux, de nouveaux modes de vie, une nouvelle mode dans la plupart des grandes villes des États-Unis, du Canada, de Grande-Bretagne, d’Europe occidentale, d’Australie, de Nouvelle-Zélande et du Japon.

Le 6 octobre 1967, ceux qui restaient dans le quartier ont joué une parodie de funérailles, la cérémonie de « La mort du Hippie », pour symboliser l’épuisement de l’évènement.

L’expression “Summer of Love” (ou plus exactement, le « Second Summer of Love ») est parfois utilisée, particulièrement au Royaume-Uni, pour parler des étés 1988 et 1989, et l’émergence de la Acid House et de la culture rave.

In April 1969, the building of People’s Park in Berkeley, California received international attention. The University of California, Berkeley had demolished all the buildings on a 2.8-acre (11,000m2) parcel near campus, intending to use the land to build playing fields and a parking lot. After a long delay, during wich the site became a dangerous eyesore, thousands of ordinary Berkeley citizens, merchants, students, and hippies took matters into their own hands, planting trees, shrubs, flowers and grass to convert the land into a park. A major confrontation ensued on May 15, 1969, when governor Ronald Reagan ordered the park destroyed, which led to a two-week occupation of the city of Berkeley by the United States National Guard. Flower Power came into its own during this occupation as hippies engaged in acts of civil desobedience to plants flowers in empty lots all cover Berkeley over the slogan “Let A Thousand Parks Bloom”.

In August 1969, the Woodstock Music and Art Fair Took place in Bethel, New York, which for many exemplified the best of hippie counterculture. Over 500,000 people arrived to hear the most notable musicians and band of the era, among them Richie Havens, Joan Baez, Janis Joplin, The Grateful Dead, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, Carlos Santana, The Who, Jefferson Airplane, and Jimi Hendrix. Wavy Gravy’s Hog Farm provided security and attended to practical needs, and the hippies ideals of love and human fellowship seemed to have gained real-world expression.

In December 1969, a similar event took place in Altamont, California, about 30 miles (45 km) east of San Fransisco. Initially billed as “Woodstock West” , its official name was The Altamont Free Concert . About 300,000 people gathered to hear The Rolling Stones; Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young; Jefferson airplane and other bands. The Hells Angels provided security that proved far less benevolent than the security provided at the Woodstock event : 18-year-old Meredith Hunter was stabbed and killed during the Rolling Stones performance.