Discuss Widdicombe and Wooffitt’s finding that members of subcultures ‘resist’ being seen as members of such a group when approached in interview situations.
Within this essay I will discuss Widdicombe and Wooffitt’s suggestions made within their book ‘The Language of Youth Subcultures’ regarding resistance and will use the subculture example of punks to portray a clear conclusion. This book is about how different identities, both social and personal are established, maintained and managed within their everyday language. Widdicombe and Wooffitt seem to narrow in specifically on youth subcultures, particularly interviews with punks. We will look carefully at the language used by them to construct their identities and why they ‘resist’ being seen of members when approached in interview situations.
Language use is an important social activity within these subcultures and can show how resistance is a central theme among the participants. ‘Subcultures emerged in relation to dominant culture, reacting against blocked economic opportunities, lack of social mobility, alienation, adult authority and the banality of suburban life.’ (Haenfler, 2004: 407) Youth subcultures attract a lot of attention from media as the members tend to be highly visible and take part in activities that the categorised ‘ordinary’ people wouldn’t engage with. This subculture is studied to help express and explore the changes within society and changes within the future. In Harvey Sacks reading, (1984), he describes the kind of work that ‘ordinary’ involves: ‘So one part of the job [doing being ordinary] is that you have to know what anybody/everybody is doing: doing ordinarily. Further, you have to have that available to do. There are people who do not have ...
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...ige, D. (1979) Subcultures: The meaning of style. London: Methuen.
Kitwood, T. (1983) ‘Self-conception among young British- Asian Muslims: confutation of a stereotype’, in G. Breakwell (ed), Threatened Identities, Chichester: John Wiley and Sons.
Leblanc, L. (1999) Pretty in punk: Girls’ gender resistance in a boys’ subculture. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
Sacks, H. (1984) ‘On doing ‘being ordinary’’, in J Maxwell Atkinson and John Heritage (eds.) The Structures of Social Action: Studies in Conversation Analysis, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Sacks, H. (1992) Lectures on Conversation, edited by G. Jefferson, Oxford and Cambridge, Mass.: Basil Blackwell.
Widdicombe, S and Wooffitt, R. (1995) The language of youth subcultures: social identity in action. London: Harvester Wheatsheaf.
Interviews:
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Victor Frankenstein and his creation were both portrayed as a villain and a hero. The Monster learned that murdering innocent people and his creator, did not bring him any peace. Instead, his murders and agony he brought upon innocent families only increased his desolation and in the end, he vowed to kill himself to put an end to his, and everyone else’s suffering. As the Monster learned too late, not everyone in the world is going to neither accept nor appreciate the beauty and knowledge someone else brings into the world. However, like the Monster found the blind man, if an individual can find that one person in the world who can look past the flaws, their life would be filled with love and
Conversation Analysis (CA) is the study of talk-within-interaction that attempts to describe the orderliness, structure and sequential patterns of interaction in conversation. It is a method of qualitative analysis developed by Harvey Sacks with the aid of Emmanuel Schegloff and Gail Jefferson in the late 1960s to early 1970s. Using the CA frame of mind to view stories shows us that what we may think to be simplistic relaying of information or entertaining our friends is in fact a highly organised social phenomena that is finely tuned in a way that expresses the teller’s motivation behind the talk. (Hutchby & Wooffitt, 2011). It is suggested that CA relies on three main assumptions; talk is a form of social action, action is structurally organised, talk creates and maintains inter-subjectivity (Atkinson & Heritage, 1984).
‘Language is considered one of the most important means of initiating, synthesising and reinforcing ways of thinking, feeling and behaviour which are functionally related to the social group.’ (Bernstein, 1959). Hence, language plays a crucial role in life and society. This essay focuses on analysing a case study of Oliver from the BBC1 documentary 7 up to 2000. The key aspect examined in this article will be the subject’s language, accent and the range of his vocabulary.
Victor Frankenstein may be the leading character in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, but a hero he is not. He is self-centered and loveless, and there is nothing heroic about him. There is a scene in Chapter twenty-four where Captain Walton is confronted by his crew to turn southwards and return home should the ice break apart and allow them the way. Frankenstein rouses himself and finds the strength to argue to the Captain that they should continue northwards, or suffer returning home "with the stigma of disgrace marked on your brows." He quite obviously has alterior motives and if he were not the eloquent, manipulative creature he so egotistically accuses his creature of being, he might not have moved the Captain and the men so much that they are blind to the true source of his passion. Unfortunately for Frankenstein, the crew, (however "moved") stand firm in their position. Yet the things he says in his motivational speech are prime examples of the extent to which Frankenstein is blind to his own faults and yet will jump at the chance to harangue others. He is so self-centered that his lack of interaction and love for others after his experiment has been completed, would barely qualify him as a person, if the difference between being human and being a person lies in the ability to have relationships with others.
Currie, Elliot. 2005. The Road to Whatever: Middle-Class Culture and the Crisis of Adolescence. New York: Metropolitan Books.
Now a days society has subculture after subculture. But what about the era before the 2000s? Back when one little change in the community had people talking, and curious. Well the “Teddy boy” era did just that. British immigrant teenagers, defined as rebels by society, who were just middle class kids, that could afford good clothing, bicycles, and sustained fairly good jobs”(Teddy Boy Movement). ,but their reputation was what alarmed the community monumentally. Due to their involvement in gangs, and acts of violence they would commit” (Nessy 2). The Teddy Boy subculture has radically affected society by exposing their rebellious acts and their “harsh sense of style” (Goldman 6).
  Kristiansen, Lars J.. Screaming for change: articulating a unifying philosophy of punk rock. Lanham, Md.: Lexington Books, 2010. Print.
Since the war in Britain the most recurrent types of moral panic has been associated with the emergence of various form of youth (originally almost exclusively working class, but often recently middle class or student based) whose behaviour is deviant or delinquent. To a greater or lesser degree, these cultures have been associated with violence. The Teddy Boys, the Mods and Rockers, the Hells Angels, the skinheads and the hippies have all been phenomena of this kind (Cohen, 2002). Youth appeared as an emergent category in post-war Britain, on one of the most striking and visible manifestations of social changes in the period. Youth...
“The catastrophe of the tragic hero thus becomes the catastrophe of the fifth-century man; all his furious energy and intellectual daring drive him on to this terrible discovery of his fundamental ignorance - he is not the measure of all things but the thing measured and found wanting.” -Robert Fagles. A tragic hero is one who dares to complete the entirety of their aspirations, resulting in an exponential downfall and early demise--failing to recognize their flaws and only pines after what ‘could’ have been. In the book Frankenstein, the author Mary Shelley expands on the theme of the tragic hero through the main character Victor Frankenstein. Initially, Victor has a fairly comfortable life. He has loving family and friends which he has strong
Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is a novel of a mad scientist Victor Frankenstein creates a hideous human creature made up of body parts. In his attempt at playing god and bringing his creation alive into the world, Victor Frankenstein creates a monster. Although the creator’s creation is pushed towards evil, it becomes obvious that Victor Frankenstein himself is the monster because he creates a human creature whom he abandons and fails to take responsibility for.
Victor Frankenstein serves as an instrument of suffering of others and contributes to the tragic vision as a whole in this novel. He hurts those surrounding him by his selfish character and his own creation plots against his master due to the lack of happiness and love. The audience should learn from Frankenstein’s tragic life and character to always remain humble. We should never try to take superiority that is not granted to us because like victor we shall suffer and perish. He had the opportunity to make a difference in his life and take responsibility as a creator but his selfishness caused him to die alone just like what he had feared.
A Single Youth Culture Youth culture and youth subcultures have been a subject of research since the early 1930s. It is most certainly true today that there is not one singular youth culture but a variety of different youth subcultures. The 90's can not be described as the same as the 60's or 70's or even the 80's. There are many reasons put forward by sociologists for this such as there are more styles available today, media influences us more and there is a higher disposable income per household to spend on fashions. This paper will explore the reasons behind the existence of youth cultures in previous years and why the same format has not occured in the 1990's.
In many instances the hero and the villain are very easy to tell between, but in the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley these two symbols come together to create confusion among readers. Many can argue that because Frankenstein’s creation viciously murdered so many people he is the obvious the bad guy in the story but what people must take into account is all the things in the creations life that caused him to behave as he did. He was one of the ugliest beings on earth, not knowing where he came from, and having no one love him. He did not begin to turn violent until his creator left him to go the world alone and be disowned by everyone that met him. Frankenstein wanted so badly to play God but when he had finally gotten what he wanted his disrespect for others took over and made him the ultimate villain. He stole what his creation needed to survive, love, acceptance, and an authority figure. Ultimately, it is Frankenstein’s selfishness that brings down not only his own self, but that of his creation as well.
Soon, he rescues a dying man on the ice, who ends up being Victor Frankenstein. Frankenstein shares his story to the captain. He shares that after years of hard work and active study, he discovers how to create life and uses what he knows to bring lifeless body parts to life. Quickly, Frankenstein realizes that the creature is a disgrace, and after seeing its appearance he decided to abandon it. However, the monster, new to the world, finds shelter near the residence of a poor family of peasants. And he realized no one else was like him in any way, he says, “When I looked around I saw and heard of none like me. Was I, a monster, a blot upon the earth from which all men fled and whom all men disowned?” Upon spying on this family, the “creation” questions his existence and expresses jealousy of the family’s happiness. After teaching himself the human language, he presents himself to the blind man in the family. The blind man is the only character in the story that does not cast a judgment on the creature, allowing the monster to express his lamentation to him. However, the rest of the family comes back and immediately rejects and judges the creation because of his repulsive image.
People who conform to society have expectations of how other people should act and what they wear in public. Anarcho-punk achieved resistance in one way by the clothes they wore. Instead of looking ‘fashionable’ they c...