Youth cultural styles: From snob to pop?

ARTICLE

Young Nordic Journal of Youth Research

Copyright © 2008 SAGE Publications (Los Angeles, London, New Delhi and Singapore) www.sagepublications.com Vol 16(3): 325–340 10.1177/110330880801600305

Youth cultural styles From snob to pop? FRITS VAN WEL Utrecht University, the Netherlands WILLEMIJN MAARSINGH Utrecht University, the Netherlands TOM TER BOGT Utrecht University, the Netherlands QUINTEN RAAIJMAKERS University of Utrecht, the Netherlands Abstract This research examines whether opposition between higher and lower forms of youth culture still contributes to the emergence of groups with different cultural tastes. Do youth at higher levels of secondary education (for example, preuniversity education) tend to display ‘omnivorous’ tastes nowadays (Peterson, 1992), just as highly educated adults do? A sample of Dutch adolescents (N = 226) completed a questionnaire concerning their preferences in several cultural domains (music, film and television, light reading and literature, receptive cultural participation). Four groups or clusters representing cultural styles were identified: omnivores, moderate omnivores, a group interested primarily in popular culture, and a culturally disinterested group; each group comprised about a quarter of the sample. Whereas girls were overrepresented in the first two groups, boys were more common in the latter two groups. The two groups with omnivorous tastes appear to fit the profile of ‘normal’ youth. Otherwise, the four cultural groups could not be linked to specific youth subcultures. Keywords cultural participation, omnivorous taste, youth culture

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A

ccording to a recent large-scale survey, tastes representing a combined preference for traditional and popular cultural activities have become increasingly common over the past few decades in the Netherlands (Van den Broek et al., 2005). This phenomenon has been documented also for other Western countries (Bennet et al., 1999; Lopez-Sintas and Garcia-Alvarez, 2002; Peterson, 2005; Vander Stichele and Laermans, 2004). In the international literature, the trend towards a less restricted cultural repertoire is referred to as ‘cultural omnivorization’. According to Richard Peterson, who coined the term ‘cultural omnivore’, this tendency is not evident at all socio-economic levels; instead he spoke of an inverted taste pyramid, with a broad pallet of cultural preferences among higher-status groups and a more limited range of preferences (that is, a more ‘univorous’ pattern) among lower-status groups (Peterson, 1992; Peterson and Simkus, 1992). Peterson observed that the tastes of the higher classes are no longer limited to the traditionally more elite cultural domain (Bourdieu, 1984), but increasingly also encompass popular culture; in the domain of music, for instance, the snob of yesteryear has become an omnivore (Peterson, 1997; Peterson and Kern, 1996). Koen Van Eijck (1999, 2000) has argued that the rise of the omnivore is associated with upward social mobility: the growing group of highly educated persons with lower-class origins shows less than complete enthusiasm for ‘higher’ forms of culture and refuses to abandon more popular, ‘lower’ forms of culture. He views the omnivorous pattern, combining tastes which would seem incompatible from a traditional point of view (for example, visiting amusement parks and museums, or listening to both classical and pop music), as typical of the postmodern lifestyle (Van Eijck, 2001). More recently, Van Eijck et al. (2002) have argued, based on Dutch data from the 1980s and 1990s, that declining interest in high culture in the higher socio-economic classes might best be explained by intergenerational differences in cultural socialization, since the 1960s one is no longer socialized to believe in the supremacy of elite Western culture. Their prediction is somber: over time the omnivore will lose ground to those who restrict themselves entirely or primarily to a diet of lower, popular culture. Recent research that investigated Peterson’s hypothesis of the shift from highbrow snob to inclusive omnivore did primarily focus on the links between these taste and consumption patterns with social status among adults (Peterson, 2005). In this line of research, no special attention was paid to youth cultural styles. Our study fills this omission. In this article, we investigate to what extent the distinction between higher and lower forms of culture still underlies the emergence of groups of youth with different cultural tastes in the Netherlands. Does the youngest generation contain a minority with elite interests, whose cultural style conflicts with the majority’s preference for popular culture? Are more highly educated youth — like today’s highly educated adults — developing broad, omnivorous tastes for a mix of elite and popular culture (Jansen, 2005); or, alternatively, does everything today revolve around popular youth culture? And finally, does educational level still influence cultural preferences among youth anyway (Voorpostel and Van der Lippe, 2001)?

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Research on youth subcultures has mainly been ethnographic in nature. In the United Kingdom, for example, research in the cultural studies tradition (Clarke et al., 1976) has focused on various types of adolescent youth cultures, including male, music preference-related youth cultures such as punk, skinhead, metal, dance, biker boys and hippies, and youth cultures with an ethnic background, such as rasta, urban, and bangra (Bennett, 2001; Hebdige, 1979; Ter Bogt, 2000). In continental Europe, the study of youth cultural phenomena has resulted in the identification of similar types of youth subcultures for Sweden (Fornäs et al., 1995) and the Netherlands (Ter Bogt, 2000). Research on youth cultural orientation tends to focus on musical preferences (Tillekens, 1993), especially the univorous musical preferences of certain conspicuous youth groups, such as punk and Dutch ‘gabbers’ (Verhagen et al., 2000). In both countries, groups of relative outsiders bond together in ‘alternative’ youth cultures (for example, punks, metal heads), in elite groups (for example, brains, posh) and in subcultures that are directly related to nightlife and popular dance music (for example, hip-hop, dance). In this research tradition, the main focus is on the more spectacular, new youth subcultures and less on the ‘traditional’ cultural differences between adolescents, such as between girls’ culture and boys’ culture (Dieleman et al., 1983; McRobbie, 1978; McRobbie and Garber, 1976). Recently, the gendered character of youth culture is stressed by authors working in the field of ‘girls’ studies’ (Aapola et al., 2005; Harris, 2004). Many youth groups manifest themselves primarily in relation to a music culture (Ter Bogt and Hibbel, 2000), although the center of gravity may lie elsewhere ( Janssen and Prins, 1991). A recent study of musical preferences among Dutch youth identified six groups with differing musical tastes (Ter Bogt et al., 2003): four of these groups represented univorous tastes in popular music (AfroAmerican, rock, dance, pop/Dutch pop); an omnivorous group could appreciate just about everything (including elite musical genres); and a disinterested group did not appear to like any kind of music. This study revealed no dividing line separating classical music lovers from fans of the various popular music genres: those who liked classical music could also appreciate popular music styles. In one of the few Dutch studies to investigate more comprehensive taste patterns among youth, four cultural styles were identified representing interest in respectively elite culture, the information culture, romantic culture (primarily girls), and a more masculine popular culture (primarily boys) (Van Wel, 1993, 1994; see also Van Wel and Van der Gouwe, 1990). These youth cultural styles were defined not only in terms of musical preferences, but also in terms of tastes in art and culture, light reading and literature, and film and television, and in terms of active and receptive cultural participation. Strong appreciation for elite or information culture was not accompanied by a strong rejection of more popular cultural manifestations; the associations between these two clusters of tastes were weakly (but significantly) positive. This result is consistent with the notion of a group with omnivorous tastes, a possibility which was not pursued further in this prior study. Young 16:3 (2008): 325–340

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In the present study we again examine whether youth preferences can be represented in terms of broad taste patterns. In this context, a wide spectrum of ‘higher’ and ‘lower’ cultural preferences will be considered. In addition, we will investigate whether combinations of preferences can be ordered along a line ranging from omnivore (broad interests) to univore (a specific interest in only popular or elite culture). It is also possible that some youth ‘rebel’ by failing to appreciate any type of culture. Finally, we examine whether these patterns in youth tastes are imbedded in encompassing lifestyle groups or youth subcultures. In analyses of lifestyle, many different facets of experience can be considered together: not only musical and cultural preferences, but also styles of dress, language use and behavior (for example, drug use), as well as more ‘internal’ characteristics (for example, attitudes, political opinions; cf. Ganzeboom, 1988). In this study we used a global indicator of youth subculture: are youth who show a particular pattern of tastes viewed by their peers as hip-hoppers, hardrockers, snobs, nerds, leftists, and so forth?

METHOD Research sample A sample of 226 adolescents (52 per cent boys and 48 per cent girls) served as respondents in this study. Their age range was 12 to 17 years, but the majority (84 per cent) were aged 14 to 15 years (the middle phase of adolescence; in the Netherlands, young people aged 12 to 24 years are referred to as ‘youth’). The respondents were second- and third-year secondary school students (primarily the latter) in two school districts in a central region of the Netherlands. Most (70 per cent) were receiving lower-level (for example, vocational) secondary education; a minority (30 per cent) was receiving upper-level (for example, pre-university) secondary education. During regular class time, the respondents completed a questionnaire with mainly fixed answer categories. The research focused on youth in early to middle adolescence because this is a phase when personal (cultural) identity begins to manifest itself.

Measurement instruments To establish a typology of cultural orientations, the adolescents were questioned about their preferences in relation to 75 cultural activities and genres in several domains, which were found to form 10 scales. 1. Receptive cultural participation. Respondents indicated whether they had visited one of 20 types of performances or institutions in the past 12 months (response categories: 0 = no, 1 = yes). Half of these cultural activities represented classical culture; the other half represented popular culture.

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(a) ‘Classical receptive cultural participation’ comprised 10 types of activities in the classical domain: opera, dance performance, classical concert, theater, art gallery or artist’s atelier, literary cinema, library, museum/exhibition, architecturally or historically significant building, literary meeting (Cronbach’s α = 0.69). (b) ‘Popular receptive cultural participation’ comprised 10 types of activities in the popular domain: dance party or house party, musical, brass band, pop concert, comedian, sports event, circus, amusement park, popular cinema, night club or disco (Cronbach’s α = 0.62). 2. Musical preferences. Respondents indicated their musical preferences in relation to 25 genres (with response categories from 0 [‘does not appeal to me at all’] to 5 [‘appeals to me very much’]). The musical genres could be reduced to the following five musical styles, which are comparable to the musical styles observed in research by Tom Ter Bogt et al. (2003) (with some minor discrepancies in the operationalization of genres). (a) Rock (six genres): hard rock, heavy metal, rock, rock‘n’ roll, punk, funk (Cronbach’s α = 0.87). (b) Dance (six genres): techno, trance, hardcore, house, dance, drum and bass (Cronbach’s α = 0.86). (c) Urban (African–American) (four genres): R ‘n B, rap or hip-hop, Latin pop, soul (Cronbach’s α = 0.77). (d) Pop (four genres): Top 40, Dutch pop, sentimental songs or ballads, boy bands (Cronbach’s α = 0.70). (e) Elite (five genres): blues, jazz, golden oldies, world music, classical music (Cronbach’s α = 0.66). 3. Images and books. Respondents indicated their preferences in relation to various genres of television, film and books. These genres could be reduced to three taste patterns observed in prior research (with some minor discrepancies in the categorization of genres; Van Wel, 1993, 1994): one elite and two sex-specific/popular taste patterns. (a) ‘Elite images and books’ (10 genres): political-cultural films, ‘heavy’ (for example, psychological) films, educational television programs, documentaries, news, programs about art and culture, books on art and culture, international literature, Dutch literature, poetry (Cronbach’s α = 0.76). (b) ‘Popular/feminine images and books’ (nine genres): romantic films, dramatic films, talk shows, family series, popular or other music programs, quiz shows, reality television programs, romantic novels, romance novel series (Cronbach’s α = 0.78). (c) ‘Popular/masculine images and books’ (11 genres): adventure or action films, cartoons, comedies, erotic films, science fiction films,

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sports programs, comedy series, crime or political series, adventure/ war/mystery novels and books, comic strips, books on technical subjects (Cronbach’s α = 0.61). Cultural styles in the adolescent sample were investigated based on 10 variables representing average scores on the two receptive patterns of cultural participation, the five patterns of musical preferences and the three patterns of preferences in the domain of images and books. These cultural styles were further considered in relation to background characteristics, age, and cultural behavior. 4. Background characteristics. Gender, educational level and ethnicity were considered in the analyses (21 per cent of the adolescents were from ethnic minority groups; ‘ethnic minority’ was defined as having been born outside the Netherlands, or having at least one parent born outside the Netherlands). Respondents also indicated the educational level of their father and mother (1 = low [only primary or vocational education], 2 = medium [only secondary or mid-level vocational education], 3 = high [upper-level vocational or university education]). Because adolescents’ financial resources could influence their cultural and recreational behavior, the respondents were asked whether they had a part-time job. 5. Cultural behavior. Several variables concerning the adolescents’ cultural behavior were included in the analyses of cultural style. The respondents were asked (a) how many hours they spent watching television per day, on average. Concerning reading behavior they were asked (b) whether a newspaper was subscribed to at their home and (c) how often they read the newspaper (1 = seldom or never, 2 = sometimes, 3 = almost every day). Respondents also indicated (d ) how many books they had read in the past month (response categories: 0, 1–2, 3 or more) and (e) how many magazines they had read in the past two weeks (response categories: 0–1, 2–3, 4 or more). Regarding cultural education, respondents were asked ( f ) whether they were taking lessons or a course in music, dance, theater or some other performing art. Finally, respondents were asked ( g) whether they had a ‘Cultural Youth Passport’ (a card — available in the Netherlands at a modest fee — conferring discounts on cultural events), (h) whether they had a library card, and (i) whether they knew about the ‘Art Gang’ (an annual cultural competition for youth). To assess participation in a lifestyle group or youth subculture, the respondents indicated how many of their classmates would consider them to be a member of each of the following 14 groups: snobs/ preppies; athletes; nerds; hip-hoppers; progressives/leftists; hard rock/heavy metal fans; punkers; hardcore fans; loners; house or dance

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music fans; Gothics; regular/average youth; popular youth; marijuana smokers (scored as 0 = no [‘almost no one’ or ‘I don’t know’], 1 = yes [‘a minority’, ‘about half’, ‘the majority’, or ‘almost everyone’]).

RESULTS Theoretically, the adolescents could be classified in terms of four possible categories based on their preferences for ‘higher’ elite and/or ‘lower’ popular culture: (1) a group with broad, omnivorous tastes encompassing both elite and popular cultural genres; (2) a disinterested group showing little appreciation for either type of cultural genre; and finally, two groups showing selective, univorous tastes favoring respectively (3) popular or (4) elite cultural genres. Departing from the assumption that four taste groups could be distinguished, a (K-means) cluster analysis was carried out. Cluster analysis is not a variable oriented method (such as factor analysis) but a personal or group oriented method. By this way, it is possible to discern broader taste groups. The clusters or groups identified in this analysis corresponded rather well to the four hypothesized categories (see Table 1). Each group comprised about 25 per cent of the sample (varying from 20 per cent to 29 per cent). Before considering these Table 1 Average taste scores in the four clusters representing cultural styles1

Domains of Cultural Taste

Cluster 4 Cluster 1 Cluster 2 Cluster 3 Moderate Total Omnivore Disinterested Popular Omnivore (N = 226) (20%) (24%) (29%) (27%)

Receptive cultural participation Classical Popular Musical preferences Rock music Dance music Urban (African-American) music Pop music Elite music

3.07 5.03

5.83HH 7.37HH

1.15L 2.49L

1.68M 5.77H

4.22H 4.77M

2.37 2.82 3.24 2.73 2.16

2.48 2.86H/L 3.49 2.97H 2.53H

2.19 2.42L 3.11 2.49L 2.03L

2.57 3.31H 3.15 2.68H/L 2.00L

2.25 2.62L 3.25 2.83H/L 2.17L

2.07 2.71

2.37H 3.01H

1.92L 2.44L

1.95L 2.64M/L

2.11L 2.82H/M

2.81

2.80

2.79

2.89

2.76

Images and books Elite images and books Popular-feminine images and books Popular-masculine images and books

Notes: 1. Significant differences (Scheffé-tests) are denoted with superscripts: HH (very high), H (high), M (middle), L (low). For example, L: < M, H and HH; M: > L and < H; H/L: not significantly < H or > L; H/M: > L.

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groups in detail, we note on a general level that the sample of adolescents in this study — most of whom were receiving lower-level vocational schooling — did not express a great deal of cultural enthusiasm. On average, the level of their cultural interests exceeded the scale mid-point in only two domains: the ‘urban’ musical genre and popular receptive cultural participation. Nevertheless, of key importance to our comparison of the four taste groups are the differences in relative interest. The first taste cluster we refer to as the omnivore group (20 per cent). This group showed by far the most interest in the elite domain (represented by three indicators: classical receptive cultural participation, elite music, and elite images and books). Although this group did not in absolute terms show great interest in the elite cultural domain, their attitudes were in any case the least negative. In the domain of popular culture, the omnivorous group’s interests were no weaker than those of the others; in fact, the omnivorous group showed the highest levels of popular receptive cultural participation. All in all, the adolescents in this group showed relatively broad, omnivorous tastes. In contrast, the disinterested group (24 per cent) scored lowest in all domains (by itself or together with other groups). The disinterested group did show lower interest than the other groups in all but three domains: urban music, rock music, and popular/masculine images and books. (There were no significant differences between any of the taste groups in these three domains.) The third group we refer to as the popular group (29 per cent). These youth showed little appreciation for the elite domain. They resembled the omnivores in terms of their interests in the popular domain, with two significant differences: the popular group showed less active popular receptive cultural participation (the omnivores could be described as overactive in this domain); and the popular group showed less pronounced interest in popular-feminine images and books. Moreover, the popular group showed somewhat more enthusiasm for dance music. The latter two differences suggest a more masculine taste pattern in the popular domain. (The popular group also showed the highest average preferences — though not significantly the highest — in the domains of rock music and popular-masculine images and books.) The three groups discussed so far — omnivorous, disinterested and popular — correspond quite well to the taste clusters that were predicted a priori. This is less true of the fourth group, which was not (as predicted) characterized by elite tastes with no interest in the popular domain. Instead, this group can be best described as moderate omnivores (27 per cent), with a medium level of interest in the elite domain (somewhat lower than the omnivores, and somewhat higher than the popular group). In the domain of popular culture, they differed little from either the omnivores or the group with popular tastes. Although they scored somewhat lower than the omnivores in all subcategories of popular culture, this difference was only significant in the case of their popular receptive cultural participation. Similarly, the moderate omnivores also reported less popular receptive cultural participation than the popular group. These two groups showed only one other significant difference: the moderate omnivores showed

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less appreciation for dance music. This suggests relatively feminine preferences among the moderate omnivores in the domain of popular culture. (They also expressed somewhat stronger preferences than did the popular group for popular-feminine images and books, and for urban and pop music.) In contrast, as we have already pointed out, the popular group showed relatively masculine tastes. The four cultural styles were also investigated in relation to background characteristics and cultural behaviour (see Table 2). This revealed a clear division along gender lines: girls were overrepresented among the omnivores and the moderate omnivores, whereas boys were more commonly found in the disinterested and popular clusters. Adolescents from an ethnic minority were somewhat overrepresented in the disinterested cluster, but this difference was not significant. Differences in educational level were also non-significant, yet they did suggest a noteworthy tendency: the disinterested group appeared to contain more youth at upper educational levels than did the omnivorous group. Concerning parental educational level, there were no clear differences between the groups. However, part-time work did serve to distinguish the omnivores from the disinterested group: omnivores were much more likely to have a job, presumably giving them the means to finance their intensive cultural participation. The omnivores distinguished themselves from the others in that they reported reading more books and magazines. A regular newspaper subscription at home forms a potential indicator of a culturally stimulating family climate. In this regard, the omnivores differed somewhat from the rest: almost everyone in this group had access to a newspaper at home. Nevertheless, the omnivores did not read the newspaper substantially more than the other adolescents (although here too the omnivorous and disinterested groups lay at opposite ends of the continuum). The omnivores were most active in the domain of cultural education: 44 per cent reported taking a course in music, dance, theatre or another performing art. Compared to the other groups — again, especially the disinterested group — the omnivores were more likely to possess a library card and to know about the Art Gang. Regarding their possession of a Cultural Youth Passport, however, the youth in the four groups did not differ substantially. To what extent are the four cultural styles embedded in lifestyle groups or youth subcultures? Table 3 shows that youth with omnivorous tastes (Group 1) were predominant not only among the snobs/preppies, but also among popular youth, athletes, and regular/average youth. The omnivores were in this sense overrepresented in the four most frequently occurring lifestyle groups. Youth in Group 2, the disinterested group, did not appear to be nested in any particular youth culture; in this sense they appear rather colourless and lacking in distinctive qualities (except for an under-representation of marijuana smokers). Overrepresented in Group 3, with popular tastes, were three youth subcultures defined by their taste patterns: house/dance music fans, hardcore fans and hard rock/heavy metal fans. At the same time, however, many within this third group thought that others would classify them within ordinary profiles such as regular Young 16:3 (2008): 325–340

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Gender (% female) Ethnicity (% minority) Educational level: youth (% high) Educational level: father low medium high Educational level: mother low medium high Part-time job (% yes) TV (hours per day) Newspaper subs. (% yes)

Characteristics and Behaviors 67 22 22 24 37 39 33 37 30 76 2.7 96

33 30 37 37 33 31 59 2.6 83

44 31 26 46 2.7 78

36 33 31

36 26 42

37 37 26 62 2.6 80

35 29 37

31 19 25

Cluster 1 Cluster 2 Cluster 3 Omnivore (20%) Disinterested (24%) Popular (29%)

48 21 30

Total (N = 226)

Table 2 Differing characteristics and behaviours in the four clusters

32 28 40 55 2.4 82

33 25 42

62 20 32

Cluster 4 Moderate Omnivore (27%)

χ2(9) = 11.3 χ2(3) = 10.9 F(3) = 0.8 χ2(3) = 6.7

n.s.