Manchester University Press
Introduction
Abstract
This chapter introduces readers to the context, subject, themes and sources used in the monograph. Inspired by theories by Judith Butler, Louis Althusser, Benedict Anderson, Dick Hebdige and Michel Foucault, the book’s main argument is that popular media like magazines, television programmes and films helped construct Italian youth as a performative identity defined by cultural practices, rather than by birth year. To identify this performative identity, the monograph uses the Italian term i giovani (young people) to define the subject of the study. The Introduction also discusses the methodological approach to the book’s three main themes. First, each chapter analyses the emergence of specific youth trends in each timeframe, focusing on media representations of young people’s fashion, hairstyles, dances and the spaces occupied by their bodies. It also explores media accounts of the ‘public’ and ‘private’ lives of young stars, who acted as spokespersons for the community of Italian youth. Second, each chapter investigates Italian youth’s appropriation of foreign trends by examining the ‘mirroring’ and ‘othering’ strategies popular media used to describe trends coming from other Western countries. Third, each chapter explores discourses connecting style and bodily practices to the media construction of Italian young people’s gender identity.
Abstract
This chapter introduces readers to the context, subject, themes and sources used in the monograph. Inspired by theories by Judith Butler, Louis Althusser, Benedict Anderson, Dick Hebdige and Michel Foucault, the book’s main argument is that popular media like magazines, television programmes and films helped construct Italian youth as a performative identity defined by cultural practices, rather than by birth year. To identify this performative identity, the monograph uses the Italian term i giovani (young people) to define the subject of the study. The Introduction also discusses the methodological approach to the book’s three main themes. First, each chapter analyses the emergence of specific youth trends in each timeframe, focusing on media representations of young people’s fashion, hairstyles, dances and the spaces occupied by their bodies. It also explores media accounts of the ‘public’ and ‘private’ lives of young stars, who acted as spokespersons for the community of Italian youth. Second, each chapter investigates Italian youth’s appropriation of foreign trends by examining the ‘mirroring’ and ‘othering’ strategies popular media used to describe trends coming from other Western countries. Third, each chapter explores discourses connecting style and bodily practices to the media construction of Italian young people’s gender identity.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Front matter i
- Contents v
- List of figures vi
- General editor’s foreword ix
- Preface x
- Acknowledgements xi
- Introduction 1
- 1 Urlatori and amici, 1958–65 29
- 2 Beats, 1965–67 57
- 3 Hippies, 1967–70 109
- 4 Fragmented youth, 1970–75 160
- Coda 210
- References 217
- Index 234
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Front matter i
- Contents v
- List of figures vi
- General editor’s foreword ix
- Preface x
- Acknowledgements xi
- Introduction 1
- 1 Urlatori and amici, 1958–65 29
- 2 Beats, 1965–67 57
- 3 Hippies, 1967–70 109
- 4 Fragmented youth, 1970–75 160
- Coda 210
- References 217
- Index 234
