

The short story "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" by Joyce Carol Oates, written in the 1960s, tells about a young girl's experience of a strange afternoon. Connie, fifteen, is an average high school girl obsessed with her looks and boys while beginning to detach from her family. One Sunday while her family was at a barbeque, Arnold Friend and his friend Ellie approach her house in a gold convertible. She doesn't know who either of these boys are, yet allows Friend to lure her outside and to the car with them, ignoring her emotions of fear. Oates dedicated her story to the legendary artist Bob Dylan, and draws many connections between his music and her story. Bob Dylan was an iconic artist in the 60s; when there was a lot of social turmoil, Dylan was writing and performing songs that reflected revolutionary change, and he gained a very large following for his talents and his views. Background knowledge of evolving popular culture in the 1960s and Bob Dylan's contributions provides proper context to understand Oates' purpose in her short story. Joyce Carol Oates wanted her short story "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" to be a part of the social revolution that was occurring in the 1960s.

The 1960s was a decade full of war, civil rights movements, changing social roles, hippies, and emerging music. Different groups of people, identified by class, race, or gender, were all trying to evoke changes in the politics related to their labels. For example, though the subject that never made it to the limelight, there were changing standards for female adolescents as they were going through their own struggles of sexuality in the process of becoming adult women. It is known that adult women were beginning a political journey of their own as they were demanding better treatment politically and socially, therefore justifying that the young women of that time would also be going through a form of social change as well. Understanding the changing role for women at this time allows for a similar understanding as to why Joyce Carol Oates would have included a teenage girl facing similar struggles in her story. Connie is the first character introduced in the story and her first description sets an example of what beauty standards were for many females at the time.  It is relatively normal for women to compare themselves to others, just as Connie's mother compares Connie to her sister, but Connie doesn't see the point in comparisons because "she knew she was pretty and that was everything" (Oates 1). Connie's belief that her appearance is the only important aspect about her reveals the standard significance of beauty in the 60s, and with the generational shift in that time came a shift in beliefs. This provides evidence that Oates' story isn't just a work of fiction for entertainment because she includes strong social messages that she is sending to young women. Women began to stray from the standards of beauty and their gender role, stating that there was more to their treatment than just being beautiful in the eyes of society. 

The largest group that pushed for change was the hippies, or people who "promoted anti-conformist attitudes and ideals" (Bhaddock). Their goal in this decade was to spread love and a sense of individualism by breaking free from institutions and doing anything that made them feel at peace. This mentality is what created their "counter-culture movement" that Bhaddock describes in his analysis of the hippie trend in the 1960s. Oates uses an evolved state of the counter culture as a setting to Connie's life, as her parents feel comfortable leaving her alone and she explores the given freedom. Connie's family, who "[never] bothered with church" (Oates 3), leaves Connie at home while they go to a family barbeque. Connie is then described as feeling "warmth about her as if this were a kind of love" (Oates 3). Connie's family is described as separated from a religious institution and Connie herself feels that she is free from the institution that is her family. The family dynamic that Connie is a part of is an example of many other families whose dynamics were also changing in the 1960s.  

The era of rock and roll was picking up speed in the 1960s with the likes of the Rolling Stones, The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, Bob Dylan, and many others. Bob Dylan stood apart from his fellow musicians though because he set out to get a message across to his audience. Music has always brought people together and Dylan probably wasn't even the first artist to use music to make political statements, however it contributed to his success as a musician in the 60s based on the changes that were going on around him. He grasped onto his own views and used his position as a new pop culture icon to spread his views and the views of others around him. It is important to remember, however, that he wasn't the one necessarily producing all of the ideas; he just shared them and made them more well known. Oates dedicated the story to Bob Dylan to draw attention to her contribution to the revolutionary ideas he also stood for. Music is seen as a thread throughout Oates' story, like when Connie first speaks with Arnold Friend and  "He spoke ... as if he were reciting the words to a song" (Oates 6). Later in the story, Oates connects the ever-present radio to a vital part of life, "as if without the radio the air was too much" (Oates 10) showing that music is something that needs to be a constant. 

In addition to Oates dedicating her story to Bob Dylan, it has been suggested that she even drew inspiration for descriptions and events from a few of his songs. Tierce and Crafton's analysis of Oates' story make excellent points of how the musical talents of Bob Dylan coincide with the story. Their strongest argument connects Dylan's song "Mr. Tambourine Man" with the confusion Connie faces when deciding if she'll leave with Arnold Friend, saying that the song "established the notion of using music to rouse one's imagination into a blissful fantasy world" (Tierce and Crafton 224). They reference an entire stanza, however the first three lines of that stanza are enough to see the connection to Connie's experience:

Take me on a trip upon your magic swirlin' ship,

My senses have been stripped,

My hands can't feel to grip, (Tierce and Crafton 224)

The "magic swirlin' ship" is obviously equivocated with Arnold Friend's car and Connie could easily share the first person thoughts and emotions in the song. Other connections between the story and Dylan's songs "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue" and " Like a Rolling Stone" emphasize that Joyce Carol Oates captured Dylan's music in her writing. She took inspiration from Bob Dylan because he was an icon that she connected with or shared beliefs with in a way, and in a strong enough way to write on it. 

Knowing an author's true purpose is hard unless they are actually asked, however it is clear that Oates wanted to make her artistic contributions to the social revolution occurring in the 1960s. There were many forms of revolution occurring such as physical protests, political rallies to change laws and rights, and artistic changes in styles of popular music and literature. Joyce Carol Oates transferred from one art form to another (music to literature) the beliefs and ideals that Bob Dylan shared and performed as an influential figure in the 60s. Understanding the tumultuous context of the sixth decade in the twentieth century helps one to also understand why Oates would write the short story "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" The ideal established at this time to share radical opinions continues today as figures in popular culture continue to spread their own forms and gain support for their abilities and views. 

