Teaser

• Get pissed, destroy!

Pay attention to style and elements of resistance

Outline

• Historical context of subcultures and style– Subculture: the meaning of style

• Important changes

• Post-CCCS, post-subcultures

• Discussion: communicating your identity

Note: more focus on fashion than music due to programming

Style

Style = “the materials available to the group for the construction of subcultural identities (dress, music, talk)” (Clarke, Hall, Jefferson, & Roberts, 1976: 53).

Style: context of research

CCCS and subculture

• Subculture tied to social background

• Subculture = resistance

• Political statement

• Style as constitutive, symbolic element of a subculture

Style: Hebdige

Study into the meaning of style

• Style = a means to express difference“The communication of a significant difference, then (and the parallel communication of a group identity), is the point behind the style of spectacular subcultures” (p.102).

• Style = intentional communication of meaning

Style: societal changes

1. More structural differentiation

2. Leisure time more important

3. Changing role of media

Buchmann, M. (2002). Sociology of youth culture,. In N. J. Smelser & P. B. Baltes (Eds.), International encyclopedia of the social & behavorial sciences (pp. 16660-16664). Amsterdam: Elsevier.

Style: societal changes

1. More structural differentiation Through the educational system Through the welfare state

– More social positions– Different ways of showing

Style: societal changes

2. Leisure time is more important

• Leisure now is lifestyle, way of social distinction– Cultural practices– Sport – Consumption

Style: societal changes

3. Changing role media

• Faster dissemination of new styles through faster ICTs

• Media offer more cultural materials for appropriation in the construction of identity/ies

Style: academic changes

Critique on CCCS Post-modernism

• From essentialist to anti-essentialist

• From monolithical to fluid and hybrid

Post/subculture

• Subculture ≠ subversive resistance of a social class“the analyses of the CCCS (…) no longer appear to reflect the political, cultural and economic realities of the twenty-first century” (Weinzierl & Muggelton, 2003, p.5)

• Subcultures = fluid formations • Blurring between subculture and the mainstream

1. Consumption en commercialization2. Subcultures are aware of the media 3. “Supermarket of style”

Style as communication of identity

Style is intentional communication, a visible construction to exists to be read, a way to communicate meaning (Hebdige, 1979)

• Style as a text

vs style embodied experience

Reading style

Context dependency Who wears what on what

occasion in which place in which company?

Social variability in signifier-signified relationship Meaning varies according to

taste, social identity and the access one has to the symbolic wares of society (e.g. Nazli in track suit with boots)

Conclusion• Style communicates the self, our social

identities.

• Style is meaningful, but this meaning is polysemic and variable.

• We need information about the performer, the performance and the audience.