Children and Consumption, Tuesday June 9th

The Rise of Youth Culture

Youth culture as we know it today developed in the early twentieth century as the result of

economic and technological change and shifting conceptions of childhood. Parents

have often found youth culture concerning, arguing that it decreases their influence and

control over their children.

Factors contributing to the development of youth culture

• Consumerism• Advertising• Mass media• Age-segregation

The 1920s

The age of the flapper

The Flapper

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7neA1I9K71c

The Jazz Age

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mBdAuXr4ssQ

Bathing Suits

Dating

Those Dreadful Young Persons, Ladies Home Journal

• “Anyone who says that ‘youths of both sexes can mingle in close embrace’—with limbs intertwined and torso in contact—without suffering harm lies. Add to this position the wriggling movement and sensuous stimulation of the abominable jazz orchestra with its voodoo=born minors and its direct appeal to the sensory center, and if you can believe that youth is the same after this experience as before, than God help your children.”

PRIMARY SOURCE: A FLAPPER’S APPEAL TO PARENTS

Cheaper by the Dozen

primary source reading & movie clip

What is “youth culture”?

1955

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZW0DfsCzfq4

1985

2004

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KAOmTMCtGkI • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHDi_AnqwN4

In what ways do adults work to change youth culture?