First published in 1976, Working Class Youth Culture offers a much-needed alternative viewpoint to the law-and-order lobby which treats the youth question as a dreadful pest to be exterminated or caged in. The contributors describe the real conditions of life for working-class youth; how they make sense of the world; and how we can understand their perspective. The subjects discussed include Teddy Boys, Mods, Skinheads and the Glamrock Cult; dance-hall fights; picking up girls and going steady; how schools manufacture delinquency, truancy and vandalism; how working-class kids slide from bad schools to bad jobs, or to no jobs at all; Paki-bashing, racism and the competition over jobs and houses; how social change in post-war Britain has influenced youth culture; and how social scientists have hidden the real character of youth troubles behind the myth of a classless society. This book will be of interest to students of sociology and anthropology.
Preface Contributors Introduction Geoff Mungham and Geoff Pearson 1. Youth and Class Graham Murdock and Robin McCron 2. Boys Will be Men Howard Parker 3. ‘Paki-bashing’ in a North East Lancashire Cotton Town Geoff Pearson 4. Youth in Pursuit of Itself Geoff Mungham 5. Beyond the Skinheads Ian Taylor and David Wall 6. When Pupils and the Teachers Refuse a Trace David Reynolds 7. Working Class Youth Cultures John Clarke and Tony Jefferson Bibliography
Biography
Geoff Mungham and Geoff Pearson
