Class Embodiment In British Youth Subculture

The Second World War brought great changes to British society. Changes in population, economy and political condition etc all had their effects on the youth. Backed by these conditions, a kind of new culture---youth subculture came into being in Britain.It is always considered that post-war Britain is the birthplace of youth subculture studies as there emerged a wave of striking youth phenomena in British society at the end of the 1950s when tremendous changes were brought about by the war. In the study of youth subculture, there existed two modes of elucidations in American and European circles: the"generation"mode which viewed subculture as classless and"social structure"mode which viewed subculture otherwise. Whether youth subculture is a phenomenon embodied with class? If not, how come that studies from some scholars still talked about it as related to class. If so, why some scholars still raised their queries? To answer the question: Whether youth subculture is a phenomenon embodied with class? This paper will devote to studying the social roots, generating factors and ways of representation of youth subculture and so on from the perspective of class. By locating the class relativity in the social roots of youth subculture, in the generating factors of youth subculture and in the representative ways of youth subculture and etc., the present writer tries to prove that youth subculture is a phenomenon embodied with class. Also, we expect studies in this thesis can shed light on cultural understanding in some way.To prove that youth subculture is a phenomenon embodied with class, the present writer plans to develop her argument as in the following five chapters:In the first chapter, this paper will point out subculture as in a subordinate position in cultural level by examining relationship between culture, subculture and youth subculture and how can youth subculture be related to class, thus it can lay foundation in theory for the later researches.In the second chapter, this paper will extend into the birthplace of youth subculture where its society was class-constructed and therefore, the rooted class stratification in the society would find its impact on every group within.In the third chapter, this paper will make a close examination of the generating factors of youth subculture. Generally speaking, the class inequality in economy and education, together with the class-dominated mass medium played a great part in dividing classes and shaping class identity.In the fourth chapter, this paper will discuss the representative styles of youth subculture which were shown differently based on class difference. Moreover, this chapter discusses confrontations and divisions between different styles of youth subculture were also for class differences.In the fifth chapter, this paper will use important studies of youth subculture that had illuminated youth subculture as closely related to neighborhood and community where their original class backgrounds had a determinant effect on the classification of their members.In the final part of this paper, grounded on all the former discussions, this paper will conclude that though the emergency of youth subculture in post-war British society was labeled as phenomenon that symbolized the disappearance of class, studying on the class relativity to the social roots of youth subculture, to the generating factors of youth subculture and to the ways of representation of youth subculture etc, we can still assert that British youth subculture in post-war world is embodied with class.