Subcultures Are Still Alive (Part One)
Today, there’s nothing truly subversive about subcultures.
During my adolescent forays into the Internet, I scrolled through countless images of older teens dressed in a plethora of styles from ratty flannel to rainbow anime hair to basic American Apparel t-shirts and fishnets. The array of styles in these photographs signaled the solidification of identity to my impressionable tween self. If I could only show up in the world like these people, then maybe I could shake off the dread of not really knowing who I was.
Seeing these images of cooler and older teens online was my first exposure to different subcultures outside teen movies like The Breakfast Club, Mean Girls, and the High School Musical trilogy. But, unlike those teen movies, these Internet groups were not part of the traditional nerd-jock-artsy trifecta.
The Internet is now home to an endless registry of subcultures, like the anime subculture, K-Pop, cottagecore, and more. Thanks to hashtags and active communities, it’s never been easier to look the part of a certain subculture. In her British Vogue essay Has The Internet Killed Subcultures?, Yomi Adegoke notes the cultural shifts toward subcultures, especially ones with non-conformist style: “…for Gen Z, shaving your head and piercing your eyebrow is probably less rebellious than when your dad did it in the ’80s.” Subcultures are easier to break not only because of the availability of information online but also because of our tempered attitudes toward the renegade aspects of subcultures.
Today, there’s nothing truly subversive about subcultures. While I miss the subculture of the late aughts and early 2010s, I can’t deny how the celebration and democratization of different identities could help my teeny-bopper self sift through different ways of identifying. How did we reach this inflection point of subcultures losing their essence? Are subcultures dead?
What are subcultures?
The definition of the term subculture is just as expansive as the plethora of subcultures that exist. According to the Cambridge Dictionary, a subculture is “the way of life, customs, and ideas of a particular group of people within a society that are different from the rest of that society." Pioneers of the study of subcultures, David Riesman and Dick Hebdidge assert that subcultures deviate from and often exist in opposition to the dominant culture. For example, punk and Teddy Boys dissented from mainstream British culture in the 1960s-80s. Yet, through these definitions, more questions pop up. When does a habit or a pattern become a way of life? What constitutes the culture of the majority?
Even distilling the characteristics of a single subculture proves tricky. In their article Rethinking Subculture: An Interactionist Analysis, sociologists Gary Alan Fine and Sherryl Kleinman outline the difficulties of pinning down the definition of the term itself. They argue that there’s “confusion between subculture and subsociety” along with the general assumption that subcultures are “homogenous, static, and closed.” For example, defining who belongs to the punk subculture is a huge feat. There are different types of punk based on geography (American vs. British punk) and chronology (punk in the 1960s vs. punk today). Subcultures evolve and that’s what makes them so hard to define in the first place.
Evolving Subcultures Online
The Internet complicates things even more. Early online spaces like chat rooms and social media networks collapse the boundaries of physical geography. It’s also easier to find people with similar interests. Growing up, I was really into anime (I still am). I’d set aside a few hours every day to watch my favorite shows after doing homework. I’d beg my parents to buy me manga and merch, like figurines and t-shirts. But, no one in my grade school was as into it as me. I turned to sites like DeviantArt, Tumblr, and Reddit to get my fill of anime and make my first few Internet friends. When the entrance to a subculture isn’t bound by language, place, and nationality, then more and more people could enter the community — until that subculture becomes mainstream.
In 1978, English punk band Crass released their song “Punk Is Dead” to critique the increasing commercialization of the music genre and, consequently, the artifacts of the subculture, like clothes and art. One cornerstone of punk ideology is not “selling out” — not bending corporate and capitalist demands. Ergo, the mass commercialization of punk goes against what punk fundamentally is. The success of pop-punk bands — an oxymoron if I ever heard one — in the Billboard 100 a decade ago proved that some groups of this subculture (definitely not all) finally crossed over to become mass culture.
Wide distribution and monetization went on overdrive with the Internet. In its earliest iterations, the Internet made exchanging information instantly and basically killed snail mail. Now, social media platforms like Twitter, X, and Instagram allow people to bypass traditional media and publishing outlets, making growing a community cheaper and easier than before. After all of us anime fans convened online, we realized that we’re not some niche interest group. In her interview with writer Allison McCracken, then-head of content at Tumblr Amanda Brennan states that subculture, Brennan said that the beauty of Tumblr — and by extension other online groups — is that “You can come to Tumblr and not feel weird because you like this anime no one has ever head of, and I think that’s really where it has changed.” Although we couldn’t find other people in the area with similar interests, that doesn’t mean other fans in other places don’t exist.
Online visibility also makes it enticing for non-fans to join the dark side due to the strength and acceptance of the community. Now, we’re getting international big-budget films based on anime, like Detective Pikachu ($150 million budget) and, the controversial Ghost In The Shell ($110 million budget). Streaming giant Netflix also made live-action adaptations of One Piece and Cowboy Bebop. Let’s also not forget the forthcoming Scott Pilgrim adaptation I wrote about previously. This subculture started as a relatively niche interest group — perhaps limited to age and geography — yet grew due to the community’s impressive size.
Ultra Niche Internet Subcultures
While the Internet accelerates the growth of existing subcultures to the point that they become mainstream, it also creates fertile ground for new subcultures to emerge. I started out on Tumblr and DeviantArt to connect with fellow anime fans but ended up falling in love with a host of other groups.
The anime community could be described as a fandom, a portmanteau of “fan” and “kingdom” to describe subcultures based around pieces of media. There’s the K-Pop fandom and the Swiftie fandom — all with their own vocabulary like “bias” and “atwtmvtvftvsgavralps!” Then, there are also subcultures based on visual elements, called aesthetics, such as soft grunge (often Lana Del Rey fans, but not always) and health goth. The abundance of subcultures online gives people — especially those in search of their identity — an overwhelming buffet of options. How does this affect our relationship with these subcultures?
When we’re online, we reconstruct our identities without our physical bodies, through avatars and even search history. When we open a horde of tabs on our browser, we’re on multiple websites simultaneously. The state of being in multitudes also carries over to our communities. Amanda Brennan continues to state that “Tumblr really bleeds fandoms together” through mechanics like tagging and reblogging. Brennan also notes how online spaces could even conceal identification with a fandom or subculture, allowing people to explore different parts of themselves: “But if you are a forty-five-year-old mom and you don’t want people to know how much you love Supernatural, you can be that person here.”
There’s freedom in being part of multiple subcultures online. One could find their so-called tribe no matter how specific or broad the interests are. Some subcultures even become mass culture, while some maintain their small communities full of committed members. They offer spaces for belonging — something which most of us yearn for.
Yet with so many subcultures for the picking and the low barrier for entry, it seems like being in a subculture lost its weight. Subculture evolved, but has it strayed to the point of being unrecognizable?
Part two coming in two weeks 🖤