Youth Identity in the Pre-Digital and On-line Worlds

Youth Identity in the Pre-Digital

and On-line Worlds

Quick Survey

Hands up…

If you regularly watch TV programmes on TV (when scheduled)?

Hands Up…

If you watch TV on‐line (4OD, iPlayer, TV‐Links, YouTube

etc.)?

Hands Up….

If you paid for music in the past two months (download, CD, gig)?

Hands Up….

If you downloaded most of your music for free?

Hands Up….

If you have watched ‘user‐generated content’

videos in past month?

Hands Up….

If you have posted videos you

have made on‐line?

Hands Up….

If you have produced a full media text (planned, produced, edited) and

posted it on‐line?

(and your A level coursework doesn’t count!)

Hands Up….

If you have bought a magazine or newspaper in the past month?

If you have read an on‐line version of an established magazine/newspaper?

Hands Up….

If you have read a fashion/culture blog (non‐professional) in the past month?

Hands Up….

If you have your own fashion/culture/opinion blog?

Exam questions

• What is collective identity and how is it mediated?

• Assess the claim that the media is becoming more democratic.

• Explore the claim the ‘new’

media are more democratic than the ‘old’

media.

In order to fully answer these question you will need to comment

on

democratic media and collective identity in

the past as well as the

present.

My Conclusions…

• The ‘teenager’

was a constructed social group, a target market.

• Created by post‐war capitalism and marketing

• 1960s/70s ‘counter‐culture’: youth rebelling against consumerism

• Created their own

youth culture

• Forerunners of ‘user‐generated’

youth culture in on‐line age

Constructing the TeenagerCreating and targeting a

youth audience –

and what the youth did next….

‘Youth Culture’

emerges

• 19th

century ‘Bowery Boys’

or ‘Soaplocks’

• Recognisable youth culture: own slang, dress code, musical taste etc.

• First time entertainment and fashion industries targeted a youth group

1900‐1940

• 400% rise in school in high school enrolment in USA

• ‘Peer culture’• Magazines (and fashion, beauty) industries

targeting insecurities of adolescent girls

• 1940s –

WWII = demand for labour = young people with disposable income

1945‐60: Birth of the Teen

• Economic potential is obvious –

“market of the future”

• But also the first negative stereotypes• Youth simultaneously represented “a prosperous

and liberated future”

and “a culture of moral decline”

• First sign of adult culture’s dichotomous image of teenagers

• But a LUCRATIVE TARGET MARKET

1950s –

Rock’n’Roll

Culture

• Not just a target market?

• Not trying to ‘fit in’

to adult mainstream

• Happy to rebel against it – first indication of a ‘Generation Gap’

• Values and lifestyles developing outside of commercial influence

1960s and 70s –

subculture to counter‐ culture

• Next generation of teens very cynical about commercial exploitation of youth.

• Rebellion chimes with social upheaval• Young people support Civil Rights, feminism,

anti‐Vietnam…

the rebels now have a cause.• Resistant to marketing and consumerism,

wanted to make the world better

‘We Media’ in the Pre- Digital Age

First, some definitions:

What is meant by ‘We Media’?

•Media that is produced and/or distributed by ‘us’

i.e. the public.

•Or: people who don’t have formal training, jobs in the media, professionals.

•‘Prosumers’

‐

People who used to be media consumers/audiences but who are now

producing or distributing media texts

‘Mediated’

collective identity

• ‘collective identity’

–

the self that finds solidarity with others who are similar.

• ‘mediated’

–

how the media portrays the social group, and the influence it has on their identity

• Links to ‘We Media’: marginalised social groups have often used media as a way of forging their own

collective identity• Challenges the way their group has been represented

in the mainstream media.

Grateful Dead

• Originated in ‘Summer of Love’

• ‘Hippies’• Turned into a travelling community that lasted

50 years

• Commune structure – internal economy

• Barter system: clothes, drugs, food

• Like a travelling circus or carnival

Punk and Hip‐hop

• 1970s Britain and US• Mainstream music industry and music press

didn’t want anything to do with these new genres/sub‐cultures; public were threatened

by music, fashion, values they didn’t understand.

• So fans had to create their own ‘scene’

to support the artists and other fans.

Punk

• Accessible: no musical skill needed to join a band, anyone can do it.

(democratic)

Punk

Music: recorded on cassettes and circulated by fans at gigs (so created

their own music industry)

Punk

Fashion: ‘bricolage’

style –

found materials ‘bits and pieces’

stitched

together. DIY fashion

(but this is how Vivienne Westwood started!)

Punk

Fanzines: •mainstream press wouldn’t review

bands, interview artists or publicise gigs•punks used the recently‐created

photocopiers to create their own ‘fanzines’

•again sold at gigs and later specialist record/clothes shops.

Hip‐hop

No formal musical training needed: just mixing records and making

rhymes – so accessible to poor, uneducated but creative public.

Hip‐hop

‘Block parties’

–

based around a sound system in community centres or

private homes, not nightclubs or traditional venues.

Hip‐hop

Not just music: fashion, dancing, magazines – all DIY, accessible culture.

Hip‐hop

Mainstream didn’t catch on until 1979 when the Sugarhill

Gang released the

first hip hop record ‘Rapper’s Delight’

Skateboard Culture

• Again, ignored by the mainstream as a fad.• Sub‐culture formed around skate parks and skate

shops• Amateur videos of skaters doing tricks –

distributed through skate shops.• Punk/metal/hip‐hop crossover bands would

soundtrack these videos.• Again, fanzines reflected and encouraged the

sub‐culture

Ravers

1989 ‐

‘Second Summer of Love’:

Massive illegal techno/house parties in fields or warehouses.

Ravers

1989 ‐

‘Second Summer of Love’:

Attendees had to meet at secret locations, call secret phone numbers

for directions. Participants need to be ‘in the know’.

Ravers

Organised by ravers

for ravers

– fashion, CDs, drugs sold at events.

Created its own ‘micro‐economy’

What do all these subcultures have in common?

Individuals have tastes that are marginalised or disapproved of by the

mainstream – so good expression of youthful rebellion.


Marginalised groups form a social network to create solidarity.

‘Collective identity’

forged.


Social networks create their own media to (music, fashion, books, films)

and distribution networks to encourage their ‘culture’.

Temporary Autonomous Zones (TAZ)

Phrase created by theorist Hakim Bey

to describe ‘free spaces’

where normal mainstream rules don’t apply


Fans can be united by their love of a specific type of media

(music, film, TV show) ignored/disapproved of by the

mainstream


They then form their TAZ to gather, socialise, exchange their

own DIY media.

Mainstream vs

Underground

• Media/fashion industries spot latest ‘underground’

trends

• Buy talent

• ‘Underground’

style becomes mainstream (“selling out”)

• Underground shifts to rebel against it

Digital Natives, Digital SelvesHow new technology has affected

collective identity

• 9‐14 year olds spend $300 billion per year in US

• Companies very keen to target youth: indication of what tastes of the future will be.

• Morgan Stanley: youth are the “vanguard of the digital revolution”

• Matthew Robson, 16 yr old intern…

opinions made cover of Financial Times!

How do youth trends spread?

Traditional Model

• Global youth was ‘atomised’

• Trend begins, usually led by a celebrity, in one country (usually USA or UK).

• Media would then spread this trend

Traditional Model

• Other nations’

youth would spot the trend, adopt it as an easy route to solidarity with

other teens.

• Popularity (and media coverage) would increase in intensity and get a wider spread of

distribution.

• Culture industries profit.

How has digital technology changed this?

• Young people have grown up taking internet, mobiles, mp3s for granted. ‘Digital Natives’

• Interactivity

–

opportunity to manipulate the media experience.

• Instantaneity

– ability to access (and experience) media texts ‘on‐demand’.

• ‘Cloud Culture’

–

information (including media texts and experiences) ‘float’

above us, we can ‘reach up’

and ‘grab’

it whenever we want.

How do youth trends spread?

21st

Century Model

• Youths create their own

style, their own media;

• They tell others about it using social networking sites, blogs

etc; quality content

downloaded and spread by viral.

• Global reach of the internet means newly invented trends are ‘instantaneously’

spread

across the world where they develop or decline according to how many people decide

to follow them.

• Then

mainstream media may become involved.

How accurate is this?

• Opinion leaders – “the coolest kid you know”

• ‘Creatives’

–

always produced their own media

• Spotted by mainstream media institutions

• Become part of ‘establishment’

media

‘Prosumer’

–

Susie Bubble

Susie Bubble

• Non‐professional fashion blogger

• Blog

became famous (UGC)

• Hired by DazedDigital

(Underground culture)

• The Observer magazine (mainstream culture)

Final Conclusions

Technology doesn’t make young people more creative.

Just makes it easier for creative people to produce quality media.

Quality attracts a wider audience – youth created ‘we‐media’

becomes more prevalent.

Final Conclusions

Youth culture still controlled by mainstream media..

…but ‘we‐media’

that young people create takes control of their representation.

Similar to pre‐digital subcultures.

More visible and prevalent.

Who controls the future of youth culture?

Documents

Youth Identity in the Pre-Digital and On-line Worlds