3.5b Thinking about Subcultures
In Moby-Dick: Then and Now, Rudy's comparison of regional differences in "swagger" offers us a way into thinking about the important concept of subculture. When they write about culture as a "total way of life" or as a "shared set of meanings," cultural scholars tended to oversimplify the lived experience of culture. No two individuals relate in exactly the same way to the traditions and materials of "their" culture; a society as diverse as the United States is shaped by the interactions of many much smaller cultural communities. For many outsiders, hip hop might be understood as a subculture while within hip hop, there are distinctive local subcultures. Keep in mind the term, "sub" here, doesn't suggest something that is "subordinate" (less valuable or powerful) or "subterranean," (below other aspects of the culture). It might be better to think of a subculture as a subset, a specialized set of practices drawn from the totality of the culture, given specific meanings for a local community.
Early on, writers on subcultures discovered that youth were particularly innovative borrowers from their "parent culture," ascribing new meanings and uses to pre-existing symbols, words, and fashions. The British punks, for example, took the swastika not as a sign of "Aryan superiority" but as a rejection of their parents' values and lifestyles: they chose this particular symbol because they were children of the generation which had defended Great Britain against the Nazis. The Goths constructed their subculture through borrowings from Victorian horror literature. Within a subculture, symbols, gestures, words, or fashions serve a double purpose: on the one hand, they signal the connections between those inside the community, allowing them a way to recognize each other and to express their shared values and meanings; on the other hand, they distinguish the members of a subculture from the general population.
Early on, writers on subcultures discovered that youth were particularly innovative borrowers from their "parent culture," ascribing new meanings and uses to pre-existing symbols, words, and fashions. The British punks, for example, took the swastika not as a sign of "Aryan superiority" but as a rejection of their parents' values and lifestyles: they chose this particular symbol because they were children of the generation which had defended Great Britain against the Nazis. The Goths constructed their subculture through borrowings from Victorian horror literature. Within a subculture, symbols, gestures, words, or fashions serve a double purpose: on the one hand, they signal the connections between those inside the community, allowing them a way to recognize each other and to express their shared values and meanings; on the other hand, they distinguish the members of a subculture from the general population.
ADD VIDEO
Or consider another classic example of a youth subculture. This group of Rockabilly fans gathers regularly on the outer edges of Yoyogi Park in Tokyo, Japan. They have chosen an identity for themselves which harkens back to iconography associated with America in the 1950s, reclaiming the greased back hair, the leather jacket and motorcycle pants, and the Rockabilly music as signs they used both to claim affiliation with each other and to signal their distance from the culture around them.
As you consider this segment, you might talk about some of the classic characteristics of a sub-culture, including:
For another, there is the gender segregation of the group. The participants are overwhelmingly but not exclusively male. So, what does in mean in a society like Japan which has a strong tradition of gender segregation that there are women who dress in Elvis drag and dance with all of these muscular guys in the park. How might the fantasies provided by American popular culture allow them to escape constraints on gender performance in their own country?
All of this is to say that some of what distinguishes this group as a subculture (their dance style, clothing, rituals, "swagger") is visible in the video; much of what links them together is less clear on the surface and has to do with the language they use, the identities they construct, the rituals they perform, and the values they express through these spectacular performances. Why, for example, do they return regularly to this same location, which is where, by some accounts, members of this subculture have gathered for several decades?
- Shared identify through rituals, gestures, clothing,language
- Hierarchy (power differentials within a group)
- Shared (sometimes alternative) values (including status symbols established within the group
- Posturing (identity performance, “swagger”)
- Naming (titles, nicknames)
- Membership rules and requirements (physical, social)
- Identity tied to place (which can layer the Identity Map activity on to this)
For another, there is the gender segregation of the group. The participants are overwhelmingly but not exclusively male. So, what does in mean in a society like Japan which has a strong tradition of gender segregation that there are women who dress in Elvis drag and dance with all of these muscular guys in the park. How might the fantasies provided by American popular culture allow them to escape constraints on gender performance in their own country?
All of this is to say that some of what distinguishes this group as a subculture (their dance style, clothing, rituals, "swagger") is visible in the video; much of what links them together is less clear on the surface and has to do with the language they use, the identities they construct, the rituals they perform, and the values they express through these spectacular performances. Why, for example, do they return regularly to this same location, which is where, by some accounts, members of this subculture have gathered for several decades?
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