decade, flappers were found in the most fashionable magazines and the most popular movies in the world. Although the look started as a wicked act of rebellion, the flapper subculture proved to be a powerful force in American society.
The next subculture Ms. Reimer and I discussed also came after a period of war, but had a very different focus than the scandalous flappers. This was the tail end of the Greatest Generation, who gave birth to America’s next powerful subculture: the Baby Boomers, who were children and teens raised in the relatively harmonious 1950s. As in the 1920s, this era followed a horrific world war, but this time “people knew they had to grow up” said Reimer, “and they did this by buttoning up.” One side effect of wartime …show more content…
By the year1980, the country had again returned to a more conservative state. During this decade, “the average American was older than in the sixties and more likely to live in the traditional bastions of the…conservative cause (which) drew strength from the emergence of a “New Right” movement, partly in response to counter-cultural protests of the 1960s” (Aboukhadijeh). This New Right gave the country a renewed focus on conservative-wing politics and traditional Christian values, and eventually resulted in another subculture: the Preppies, a term derived from the uniforms found at exclusive East Coast preparatory schools. These young adults tended to be Republican, Christian, and from the East Coast, and were self-dubbed workaholics who perpetuated the idea that “America needed to focus on itself again by working hard” according to Reimer, instead of on the freer cultures of earlier decades. Preppies also had “a focus on social achievement, uniformity of style, propriety, proper decorum and class distinction” (Hogan), another distinct change from the liberal Hippie counterculture, and took joy in the “culture of exclusivity” (Hogan) perpetuated by the expensive clothes and accessories they chose, which was aided by “the rampant consumerism of the 1980s” (“The 1980s”), since people had greater access to consumer products than ever before. Being able to afford
The next subculture Ms. Reimer and I discussed also came after a period of war, but had a very different focus than the scandalous flappers. This was the tail end of the Greatest Generation, who gave birth to America’s next powerful subculture: the Baby Boomers, who were children and teens raised in the relatively harmonious 1950s. As in the 1920s, this era followed a horrific world war, but this time “people knew they had to grow up” said Reimer, “and they did this by buttoning up.” One side effect of wartime …show more content…
By the year1980, the country had again returned to a more conservative state. During this decade, “the average American was older than in the sixties and more likely to live in the traditional bastions of the…conservative cause (which) drew strength from the emergence of a “New Right” movement, partly in response to counter-cultural protests of the 1960s” (Aboukhadijeh). This New Right gave the country a renewed focus on conservative-wing politics and traditional Christian values, and eventually resulted in another subculture: the Preppies, a term derived from the uniforms found at exclusive East Coast preparatory schools. These young adults tended to be Republican, Christian, and from the East Coast, and were self-dubbed workaholics who perpetuated the idea that “America needed to focus on itself again by working hard” according to Reimer, instead of on the freer cultures of earlier decades. Preppies also had “a focus on social achievement, uniformity of style, propriety, proper decorum and class distinction” (Hogan), another distinct change from the liberal Hippie counterculture, and took joy in the “culture of exclusivity” (Hogan) perpetuated by the expensive clothes and accessories they chose, which was aided by “the rampant consumerism of the 1980s” (“The 1980s”), since people had greater access to consumer products than ever before. Being able to afford