How did advances in technology and the development of the market contribute to new varieties of youth culture?
Affluence combined with other crucial demographic, technological, ideological and institutional factors led to new varieties of youth culture. The youth of the 1960s were generally conformist and apolitical. Young people were at a stage in their life where they were most motivated to construct identities, to forge new social groupings and to negotiate alternatives. They had chosen the liberating potential of American mass culture in rebellion against parental control and authority, and cultural imposition. This American culture provided this younger generation with alternatives of non-conventionality, informality and a sense of …show more content…
Numerous factors contributed to the emergence of a variety of youth cultures including supportive institutions such as the underground press, the influence of advertisements and marketing or promotional techniques, but most significantly consumerism. What began as a novelty and seen as typically American culture in the late 1940s and early 1950s, became the acquired repertoire of an international youth culture in the 1960s. Increased employment resulted in better living standards which included the consumption of television sets, records and concert tickets. The introduction of new genres of music and topical lyrics resulted in young people reflecting on their lives and realising that their society was in desperate need of change. Rock 'n' roll bands as well as certain movies and television programmes were influential in the establishment of a variety of youth cultures. These images of rebellion an defiance were the fuel that the vehicle of youth culture needed. The numerous youth cultures that emerged were not as revolutionary or as successful as they hoped to have been. They attempted to negotiate, then transform the post-war culture into a free and innovative society where the burdens of World War II were lifted and a newly established culture could be formed. Instead, these youth movements created a culture that was both a critique of their society and a symptom of its worst
Affluence combined with other crucial demographic, technological, ideological and institutional factors led to new varieties of youth culture. The youth of the 1960s were generally conformist and apolitical. Young people were at a stage in their life where they were most motivated to construct identities, to forge new social groupings and to negotiate alternatives. They had chosen the liberating potential of American mass culture in rebellion against parental control and authority, and cultural imposition. This American culture provided this younger generation with alternatives of non-conventionality, informality and a sense of …show more content…
Numerous factors contributed to the emergence of a variety of youth cultures including supportive institutions such as the underground press, the influence of advertisements and marketing or promotional techniques, but most significantly consumerism. What began as a novelty and seen as typically American culture in the late 1940s and early 1950s, became the acquired repertoire of an international youth culture in the 1960s. Increased employment resulted in better living standards which included the consumption of television sets, records and concert tickets. The introduction of new genres of music and topical lyrics resulted in young people reflecting on their lives and realising that their society was in desperate need of change. Rock 'n' roll bands as well as certain movies and television programmes were influential in the establishment of a variety of youth cultures. These images of rebellion an defiance were the fuel that the vehicle of youth culture needed. The numerous youth cultures that emerged were not as revolutionary or as successful as they hoped to have been. They attempted to negotiate, then transform the post-war culture into a free and innovative society where the burdens of World War II were lifted and a newly established culture could be formed. Instead, these youth movements created a culture that was both a critique of their society and a symptom of its worst