Punk Subculture Impact On Society

Punk rock music has been used for decades to express dissatisfaction with society, government, or any idea common in mainstream media. Yet punk rock is not simply a tangent of the mainstream, it is a dynamic and fluid genre with many distinct songs. Don Letts, a mainstay in the London punk scene during the 70’s and 80’s, went as far to say that hip-hop was essentially “black” punk. While punk and hip-hop music are stylistically different, the fundamental tone of the two genres is the same. Even throughout the decades, hip-hop has sang the same issues as punk, including the plight of the lower class, police brutality, and gang violence.

Punk rock ideologies were expressed though music and lyrics, punk literature, fashion and visual art. In the beginning punk fashion evolved everyday objects like safety pins and

As defined in our text, subcultures are groups of people that have their own shared values and norms, giving them a common identity that sets them apart from . They represent specialized interests around which its members have chosen to build tiny worlds.

Music, in the past, has often spelled bad news to society at large. It can challenge norms and invoke a sense of hype in places that modern culture may be uncomfortable with, such as sex, sexuality, and drugs. Personally, when I think of punk music, I see a genre that stands to be individualistic, aggressive, and rebellious. Phrases such as ‘anti-establishment’ also come up. This notion comes from many aspects of punk subculture, including dress, music, performance, and my interpretations.

Though many will jokingly argue that “punk is dead” Punk is still very much alive in today’s society. From Mohawks to mosh pits punk has had an impact on today’s culture. Ironically enough punk once known as being a counterculture to the mainstream has now become a large part of it. It can be seen in fashion and dance and especially music. Overtime punk has changed and evolved. It has branched out into numerous sub genres such as pop punk, glam punk, skate punk, and many more. Bands like Fall Out Boy, Greenday, Paramore, The Wonder Years, and All Time Low are modern examples of punk. These bands continue to draw in the younger audiences, because they still exemplify the free and rebellious nature of punk. Punk will continue to live as long

Mike Ness is the lead singer and has seen how the “punk rock style” changed from being looked down upon and then slowly became culturally accepted. The “punk rock style” in 2014 is very criticized and looked down upon within our society. In my experiement culture shcok was probably the most prevalent sociological

     Anti-conformity has always been a prominent thread running through punk. The unofficial creed has always been that to truly define yourself you can’t be like your parents or your friends. You have to be yourself and to cut yourself out of stone. Each punk band you ever encounter will be slightly different from all the others. Some bands are lyrically different for their song lyrics, some for their guitar chords, and some for the theme of their music. But whatever the music is about, you can always be assured that it will be high energy, raw, and honest. The

Societies are a group of individuals living amongst one another who share land and a common culture. A culture is the learned customs, knowledge, behavior, beliefs and objects within a society. Finally, a subculture is a culture within a broader or mainstream culture, with different values and beliefs based on the social group. Many people living within the same community, such as Canada, have the same or similar culture. For example, Canadians love to eat maple syrup and love to watch hockey, however, this just pertains to the mass and general public.

     The punk subculture is often seen as a rebellious group of misguided youngsters who often come from lower class dwellings and haven’t gotten the attention that they needed so they dye their hair, dress differently, and act differently. In Facing The Music edited by Simon Frith, Mary Harron reduced the meaning of punk to “the spectacle of middle-class children dressing up in a fantasy of proletarian aggression and lying desperately about their backgrounds” (History). The flipside to that is that maybe these youths are expressing their individualism and choose to stray away from

Most of the original rebellion was directed towards the British class structure. They wanted to express their disapproval of the structure that governed their country. In The Jam’s “Eton Rifles”, the band sarcastically attacks the upper class, calling them arrogant and preaching to them that rugby is the only thing making them strong (Punk 68). The Sex Pistols’ album “God Save The Queen” portrays the Queen of England with a safety pin through her nose on their cover. The reaction to this outburst of shocking rebellion from the mainstream society was a strong, displeased one. American writer Greil Marcus defined punk as, “…refusing the future society has planned for you.” Thousands of social misfits attempted just that. Through the many causes for this rebellious political expression: communism, anarchy, feminism, etc., the punks of England had a focus and a reason. It was this that made the “punk” a valid, yet undesired member of society, and the British public got to see this sociological change first hand (Chamberlain par.8). Although this movement was short lived, its impact was a phenomenon, and its effects were long- lasting, which distinguished this group from previous generations.

Everyone has a culture, a series of beliefs and principles that govern day to day life that they were likely imparted upon by their upbringing. Parents usually raise their children the only way that they know, which causes the next generation to bring up their offspring in a similar fashion. Culture tends to have borders, which generally follow the borders of nations or civilizations. So imparted from young these cultures govern everyday actions that each individual will likely take at any point in their life. Culture groups lead people to think think a certain way, dress with a particular fashion, talk with an unusual accent, or uncountable varieties of actions. Culture is by no means a concrete fact, people rebel against their culture, or

The ethnicity stereotypes are similar from, yet they are different cultures. The differences of each culture in a country are the enrichment of the same country. The culture of others countries come with their stereotypes and values to express them. For example the Mexican- American culture.

Another characteristic of a subculture is the language/jargon used by its members. Language can refer to the way its members walk, talk, carry themselves, the slang words used, etc. Within my gymnastics team there was a lot of language we used that set us apart from other subcultures. The technical terms used in the sport of gymnastics is one of the obvious language barriers because only those who are familiar with the sport understand the terms and their meanings. The way gymnasts carry themselves also sets them apart from others. An example of this is when I was on the track team, a coach pointed out that I ran like a gymnast. Although I was not with my teammates or talking about gymnastics, the way I ran was an indicator of the subculture I was associated with.

Subculture refers to a minority of individuals who adhere to different rules, dress codes and lifestyle choices from mainstream culture. Throughout this essay the traditional definitions of subcultures, that mainly concentrate on class and style as their main features, will be looked at and explained. It will then be demonstrated how these ways of thinking are no longer relevant to the 21st century therefore the term 'subculture ' needs to be rethought for it to be an applicable category in the 21st century.

The punk subculture was one of the influential revolutions on the 20th century, which originated in in the 1970s and spread across countries that included the United Kingdom, the United States of America and Australia. This subculture was based on a loud, aggressive genre of music called punk rock, and it intended to gain individual freedom for the working class. This essay explains the journey from the evolution and widespread of the punk subculture in the UK in 1980s. As the title suggests, punk fashion has been ruptured, tweaked and re interpreted by individuals and fashion designers over and over again, and its style has been re adapted to juxtapose on contemporary trends.