Are we living through a great subcultural renaissance?

Subcultures aren’t dead: they’ve evolved and are undergoing a renaissance. Speaking to over 3,000 16- to 24-year-olds, seven experts and a youth focus group in our new insight report, Dazed Studio explores the meaning of subcultures now, how they’ve changed, and what they reveal about youth culture. If you’re interested to read or find out more, sign up for our webinar on December 6 here or purchase the full report here.

WHY SUBCULTURES, WHY NOW

In recent years, there’s been an ongoing debate on whether subcultures are dead. But in a time where the ‘mainstream’ ceases to exist and being alternative has become aspirational, subcultures are thriving in new ways and multiplying by the minute. Today, the process of defining subcultures is a complex one, but this isn’t to say that it has ever been simple.

WHERE IT ALL STARTED

Subcultures often emerge as byproducts of groups within society feeling disenfranchised with culture at large. Right now, young people around the world couldn’t be more dissatisfied with ‘the status quo.’ They are voting less, rejecting party membership, and telling researchers that their country’s leaders aren’t working in their interests.

Arguably, subcultures have always existed throughout time, but the familiar concept of subculture officially entered the discipline of sociology (albeit through a Western lens) at the Chicago school in the 1920’s, when it was applied to interpret “deviant” behaviour. They emerged more distinctly in the 20th century, with groups such as The Bloomsbury Group emerging in the 1910s, Teddy boys and girls in the post war 50s, punks in the 70s, goths in the 80s and skaters of the 90s, each responding to the cultural climate of the time.

Then the internet changed everything. Some believe that social media killed subcultures, which are defined now by aesthetics and overnight trends rather than a movement with deeper or lasting cultural significance. However, as cultural curator Samutaro puts it: "Subcultures won’t ever die, they just exist differently now. There are still a lot of interesting things happening.”

88 per cent of youth believe that subcultures exist today and the majority of youth believe subcultures are influential to them in their lives

RECONTEXTUALISING THE NOW

Understanding the cultural and societal contexts of the times radically alters our interpretation of counterculture. We’re holding subcultures today up against previous (and arguably more ‘defined’) ones of the past which had an extremely different contextual backdrop.

One of the main differences between then and now is that today, we live in a consumerist society and an era of hyperindividualism. Audiences are addressed as ‘consumers’ and they themselves are brands. As Ari Versluis, photographer and co-founder of Exactitudes, the art collective says: “The way we organise cities has changed. There are cameras everywhere. There are hardly any spaces where you don’t find places to consume.” However, as academic Shane Blackman puts it, “subcultures may be consumerist, but that does not eliminate their potential for resistance.”

Beyond this, the internet has completely fragmented the landscape in which subcultures exist, creating an immense number of disposable trends and an almost paralysing amount of information. In the era of the immersive internet, youth identities are now fluid and dynamic. This has resulted in a more expanded definition of subcultures. “Is the internet a subculture?”, a young man in the US asked in our survey. “The boundaries of subcultures are so nebulous these days,” said another.

Because of the internet, subcultures are more fleeting; Alexander Fury refers to them as being “like fruit flies.” They are often more aesthetically driven and with a lower level of personal commitment. On the contrary, the internet has allowed niche communities to connect and thrive through shared interests and beliefs. Now subcultures are, as Fury puts it, “a niche within a niche within a niche.” Examples from our survey include “weird neurodivergent queer esoteric Twitter subculture” and ”climate change dystopian nihilist”. Are these multiplying niches reflective of a global youth desire to differentiate against a mass of homogeneity?

“So much of subculture to youth now is nostalgia. A yearning for the past and previous subcultures” – Ari Versluis

HOW YOUTH ARE REDEFINING SUBCULTURES

Subcultures are now niche and mass, community-driven and self-initiated, deep and surface level, past and present. You can now be part of multiple subcultures, you can dip in and out, and they’re more accessible. In the current ‘main character era,’ young people believe that it doesn’t even take a collective group to make a subculture. “I think people make subcultures by putting ‘core’ on the end of things. I think now one person is enough to be a subculture,” one person from our focus group told us.

Subcultures now represent core elements of young people’s identity that provide meaning in a world where they feel disconnected from each other and from mainstream culture, incorporating everything from “Sikhism”, “arty lesbian”,“transgender”, “brainwashed Gen Z” and “queer femme.” Many responses in the survey reflected hyperindividual gender and ethnicity. 

We can’t ignore the large elephant in the room, either: we’re in the midst of a youth mental health crisis. Another person from the focus group said: “I definitely think we’re in a loneliness epidemic. It was very lonely in London and I know that many of my friends felt that strongly. But I think it’s a global issue.” Perhaps this desire for comfort and control is also fuelling nostalgic revivals of subcultures: as Versluis points out, “so much of subculture to youth now is nostalgia. A yearning for the past and previous subcultures.”

WHAT DOES THIS ALL MEAN?

What’s clear is that the global eruption and mass adoption of subcultures and the niche reflects an increasing instability and lack of satisfaction with mainstream culture. As with the renaissance – a cultural movement characterised by an effort to revive and surpass the ideas of the past – we see this happening now through subcultures. Youth are taking back control and using the internet as a space for connection, expression, remix and revival. The argument of whether they’re dead or alive is almost irrelevant as subcultures resonate and reflect not only the mood of the time but the identities of youth now.

Interrogating subcultures needs a new lens of analysis. In our new report, we explore this through a decoding of subcultures to show mindset shifts, generational moods and youth archetypes emerging from the mass of data, trends and cores.