Music recorded in 1938
1938 was a year in which national borders were reorganized and preparations for total war were made, while popular culture centered on radio and records became more widespread. In Europe, the Anschluss, in which Nazi Germany annexed Austria, took place from March 11 to 13, and Adolf Hitler (1889–1945) led a forcible restructuring of the national structure. Furthermore, the Munich Agreement of September 30, agreed upon by Neville Chamberlain (1869–1940), Édouard Daladier (1884–1970), and Benito Mussolini (1883–1945), further destabilized the international order with its concessions regarding the Sudetenland of Czechoslovakia. The refugee problem also worsened, and even after the Évian Conference (July 6–15), the barriers to acceptance remained high, and Kristallnacht (November 9–10) shocked the world by visualizing the violence of persecution. During the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939), the Battle of the Ebro (July 25–November 16) became a protracted war of attrition, further strengthening the pattern in which political propaganda and international public opinion moved in parallel with the battlefield.
In Asia, too, the circuits of war and control expanded. The Second Sino-Japanese War expanded from the Battle of Taierzhuang (March 22–April 7) to the Battle of Wuhan (June 11–October 27), making it increasingly clear that the conflict would be protracted. In China, the destruction of the Yellow River levees at Huayuankou in Henan Province in June 1938 triggered an artificial flood, demonstrating the potential for war to destroy not only cities but also rivers and the very foundations of rural life. In Japan, under the first Konoe Cabinet, the National Mobilization Law was promulgated on April 1 (and went into effect on May 5), institutionalizing the control of human and material resources and accelerating the transition to a wartime economy. Furthermore, the Battle of Lake Khasan (July 29–August 11) aggravated tensions as a military conflict on the Japanese-Soviet border, exposing the instability of international relations in the Far East as well.
At the same time, institutions, science, and the media were moving toward "popularization." In the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945) signed the Fair Labor Standards Act on June 25, establishing federal minimum standards for wages, working hours, and child labor. The Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act was also enacted on the same day, strengthening safety regulations for consumer goods and medicines. On the scientific front, nuclear fission was experimentally confirmed in late 1938, ushering in the atomic age that would transform the world's technological and political outlook in the postwar era. Furthermore, Albert Hofmann's (1906–2008) synthesis of LSD in 1938 foreshadowed later cultural history.
On January 16, Benny Goodman (1909–1986) performed at Carnegie Hall, symbolizing the integration of swing and jazz with the audience culture of large halls. On October 30, Orson Welles' (1915–1985) radio drama The War of the Worlds (1938) was broadcast, demonstrating the influence that broadcast media could have on our sense of reality and collective psychology. Furthermore, in comics, Superman (1938) appeared in Action Comics #1 (#1, 1938), strengthening the modern character industry, which linked print to film, broadcasting, and advertising. The year 1938 marks the year when, amid the darkness of looming war and control, records and broadcasting spread "shared entertainment" and "shared anxieties" at equal speed, redrawing the map of popular culture.
