Historians that came of age during the middle to late twentieth century, like Eric Hobsbawm, tended to turn their attention toward social and cultural events and themes. This was due to the great number of unprecedented changes in social and cultural life that took place in the Western world after the WWII. These changes include the great economic expansion of that period, the baby-boom effect, the proliferation of new industrial goods like household devices and plastics, the cheap access to air transport, the counter-culture movement, the birth of pop culture and rock n' roll, the hippie wave, the civil rights movements, and the political and cultural emancipation of the youth, among many other aspects.
