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GENERATIONS Our place in history

Sociology of post-industrial America

This section will briefly summary ideas on trying to analyze how different age groups have very similar characteristics and how they ultimately make their mark on society through their own actions, attitudes, and achievements.

COHORTS

How do we talk about generations?

In psychology a generational group is called a 'cohort'.

The social, political, and technological circumstances of society under which a cohort grows up often imbues them with a certain outlook or world view. In other words, there exists a 'generational personality' due to common experiences of a cohorts location in history.

One way to group generations after WWII that has been proposed is:

Baby Boomers "Me" Generation Generation X Generation Y

born:'45-'54

teens during '61-'72

60's children some 50s

born: '55-'65

teens during '72-'82

70's children some 60s

born: '66-'76

teens during '82-'94

80's children some 70s

born '77-'97

teens during '92-

90's children some 80

All dates are meant to be approximate cut offs to make generalizations.

Many authors label Generation X anyone born between 1961 and 1980

WHAT IS GENERATION X?

Often called the 13th generation for being the 13th generation of Americans born since Benjamin Franklin's time, Gen Xers have alternatively been labeled as "post-yuppies", "baby busters", "slackers" or just "lost". Some writers have used characterizations such as:

Gen Xers missed the idealism of the "sixties" era but are left to clean up the mess

They are the angst ridden youth who "Focus on the present, can't remember the past and
don't care about the future".

There's no war to protest and free sex is too dangerous, so they best they can do is sit there shocked to see 'Best of the 80's' CDs advertised on TV.

Gen Xers grew up with:

The AIDS crisis

The economic recession of the late 80's and early 90's
(remember the movie Falling Down with Michael Douglas)

Watching satirical TV such as the Simpsons and Married with Children

The largest influx of naturalized citizens and diversity in history
(did you have to debate multiculturalism and diversity in college)

The largest national deficit & debt in US history
(remember Ross Perot)

MTV and the remote control mentality
(remember when they actually played music videos)

The cold war and fear of nuclear armageddon

The Iran hostage crisis and oil embargo of the late 70's

The largest rise in divorce, illegitimacy, and absent fathers in history

Said one Gen Xer "If you grew up with Reagan and the Bee Gees, you'd be depressed too", and to paraphrase another, we didnt grow up under the tail of Kennedy, we grew up under the tail of Nixon. The "boomer age media" characterization of Gen Xers soon became clear: aimless, cynical, and alienated. These stereotypes were reinforced by Madison Avenue who thought they had found a Rosetta Stone to a new marketing niche.

Consider how well certain media portrayals of this generation match up to pop icons:

computer savvy-- information overload	Max Headroom the techno jestor imprisoned within a tv sound bite
lost latch key kids of divorce	Teenage Muntant Ninja Turtles washed down the sewer, deformed by radiation, nutured on junk food and pizza
the unachievers who cant find other countries on a map	Bart Simpson mouthy yet street savy who's happy just fighting the system
self absorbed individualists	Dennis Rodman craving attention, going to the highest bidder

Why call us an 'X'?

Douglas Coupland who wrote the book Generation X around 1990, thus coining the term, had this to say in a 1995 interview

The book's title came not from Billy Idol's band, as many supposed, but from the final chapter of a funny sociological book on American class structure titled Class, by Paul Fussell. In his final chapter, Fussell named an "X" category of people who wanted to hop off the merry-go-round of status, money, and social climbing that so often frames modern existence. The citizens of X had much in common with my own socially disengaged characters; hence the title.....

and later when Gen X seemed to become a simple marketing cliche Coupland stated

...And now I'm here to say that X is over. I'd like to declare a moratorium on all the noise, because the notion that there now exists a different generation - X, Y, K, whatever - is no longer debatable. Kurt Cobain's in heaven, "Slacker's" [a supposedly Gen X movie along with "Reality Bites"] is at Blockbuster, and the media refers to anyone aged thirteen to thirty-nine as Xers. Which is only further proof that marketers and journalists never understood that X is a term that defines not a chronological age but a way of looking at the world.

And so begins the backlash about being labeled and told you're a cynical slacker.

Ok so what really defines the X generation

depressing economic circumstances	While the current economic boom of the late 90's may be making this passe, the rise of so called 'Mc Jobs', or a low wage living, hit many Xers as they were in early career years or even just coming out of college.
a sense of lack of power, no idealism or charge as part of a social movement.	The lack of any specific social movement such as the 60's counterculture or even the 40's civic generation of WWII leaves us in a world seemingly without purpose.
lack of identity	As stated above their is no event which seems to define us.
apathy and cynicism	Partially for the above reasons and living during the 80's cold war and drugs and AIDS epidemics.
nothing to rebel against	The economic expansion of the 80's and expanding consumer goods led many of us to grow up in the suburbs with walkmans and video game systems. Given the upper-middle class demographics of our community in particular it becomes hard to challenge your elders when they can seemingly offer you anything you want. Of course you could always grab a skateboard and call yourself 'grunge'.

The major political issues we will deal with are:

Social security and the national debt

Additional challenges to our ability to lead the country are:

substance abuse and crime, the environment, U.S. role in international affairs, defining 'values' and 'family', healthcare, multiculturalism

Alternate History

Aimless, cynical, grunge, disaffected?

Sometimes a different type of Gen X example will also hit the news. Consider Aaron Lieberman, featured in a December 1998 article of the San Diego Union-Tribune. Liberman was educated at Yale and was suppose to become a lawyer, but started a tutoring program for poor children enrolled in the governments Head Start program which he continues to expand. This lean towards service, hard work, and responsible values is a marked contrast to the media's attempt to market a generational persona. Said Liberman, " The idealism of the baby boomers set the stage for us to say what you're saying isnt really happening...They put the ideas out there. We're trying to make them happen." Another Gen X member was elected the youngest ever leader of the national environment group the Sierra Club.

So is the media characterization of Gen X really an objective look or perhaps just the neurotic transference of the baby boomers afraid at what is coming next. Said one critic in the book 13th Generation:Abort, Ignore, Retry, Fail:

"Wait a minute, why do we have to be a generation at all? Why can't we just peacefully take up our place on the great palette of time without people... coming along and calling us ‘post-whatever' and ‘neo-pseudo-classical-glurb'? I take offense. I may not have the demographical skill to summon up all three trillion of you boomers into one cohesive ‘impulse item rack' at Walmart, but I like being nice and undefinable. You're taking the fun out of everything".

Perhaps far from being alienated grunge youth it is better to consider that

"X is not an uncontrolled variable but a variable of unlimited potential"

---John Willard, founder Gen X Coalition

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