Page 104 - Cultural Studies A Practical Introduction

88 Identity, Lifestyle, and Subculture

own virtues arose from within themselves and that they would arise from
within Native Americans if they were given the chance to cultivate them.
Some immigrant groups, on the other hand, sought to “ pass ” as WASPs
by adopting the names and the lifestyle associated with WASP culture.

The study of modern subcultures at first focused on youth subcultures
in Britain. Youth, especially adolescence, is an inventive and creative time
in many people ’ s lives. Emerging into adulthood, young people have supple
minds and lively imaginations, and they are not yet required by the world
of work to conform to prevailing standards of dress in order to be success-
ful and to earn a living. Clothing and behavior standards do apply, of
course, but they are not hard - wired to economic survival, and youth can
enjoy a greater tolerance toward wildness of dress than adults, whose dress
is more likely to be interpreted as a sign of character or of dispositions
required for professional responsibilities. Indeed, such subcultural prac-
tices on the part of youth as wildness of dress and nonconformity in regard
to musical taste can be disruptive of conventions that enforce conformity.
They can even disrupt more overt attempts at censorship by authoritarian
governments, as the Chinese government discovered when it attempted to
suppress a particular kind of televised youth music show that nevertheless
reappeared in other venues after being banned from the airwaves.
Eventually, the government was obliged to relent, and the popular shows
became the basis of Cosplay, a major cultural form adopted from Japan
1
for young people who dress up in various parts and perform on stages.
The first studies of subcultures were concerned with their rebellious

character. Subcultural style in dress, body decoration, behavior, and music
was seen as a way of affirming a sense of value in the face of a dominant

culture that treated working - class youth as if they had no value (especially
in England ’ s more class - stratified society). The “ meaning of style ” in sub-

cultures such as punk in the 1970s was precisely that it allowed working -
class youth to make meaning of their otherwise rather economically
blighted lives. The music was appropriate for kids who could hardly afford
to buy instruments like guitars let alone take expensive music lessons. It
emphasized amateur discordance and was deliberately unprofessional.
Subcultures provide an identity to participants in the subcultural lifestyle
by demarcating them from other social groups that are often perceived to
be dated, conservative, conformist, and mainstream. Often that main-
stream is itself the residue of a subculture that has lost its allure and useful-
ness or that belongs to another generation slightly older than the new
subculture ’ s participants. Punk, for example, came into being in difference