Counterculture (also written
counter-culture) is a
sociologicalSociology is the scientific or systematic study of human societies. It is a branch of social science that uses various methods of empirical investigation and critical analysis to develop and refine a body of knowledge about human social structure and activity, often with the goal of applying such...
term used to describe the values and norms of behavior of a
cultural groupA cultural group is a self-defined group of people who share a commonality of cultural experience. Cultural groups may be defined by many types of commonality, such as ethnicity, religion, or physical commonality, as seen in Deaf culture....
, or
subcultureIn sociology, anthropology and cultural studies, a subculture is a group of people with a culture which differentiates them from the larger culture to which they belong...
, that run counter to those of the social mainstream of the day, the cultural equivalent of political opposition. It is a
neologismA neologism ; from Greek νές is a newly coined word that may be in the process of entering common use, but has not yet been accepted into mainstream language. Neologisms are often directly attributable to a specific person, publication, period, or event...
attributed to
Theodore RoszakTheodore Roszak is professor emeritus of history at California State University, East Bay. He is best known for his 1968 text, The Making of a Counter Culture.-Background:...
.
Although distinct countercultural undercurrents have existed in many societies,
here the term
"counterculture" refers to a more significant, visible phenomenon that reaches critical mass, flowers and persists for a period of time. A countercultural movement expresses the ethos, aspirations, and dreams of a specific population during an era — a social manifestation of
zeitgeistZeitgeist is a German language expression referring to "the spirit of the times" and/or "the spirit of the age." The word Zeitgeist is used to describe the general cultural, intellectual, ethical, spiritual, and/or political climate within a nation or even specific groups, along with the general...
.It is important to distinguish between "counterculture", "subculture" and "fringe culture".
Countercultural milieux in 19th-century Europe included the traditions of
RomanticismRomanticism is a complex artistic, literary, and intellectual movement that originated in the second half of the 18th century in Western Europe, and gained strength during the Industrial Revolution...
,
BohemianismBohemianism is the practice of an unconventional lifestyle, often in the company of like-minded people, involving musical, artistic or literary pursuits, with few permanent ties...
and of the
DandyA dandy is a man who places particular importance upon physical appearance, refined language, and leisurely hobbies, pursued with the appearance of nonchalance in a cult of Self...
. Another movement existed in a more fragmentary form in the 1950s, both in Europe and the US, in the form of the
Beat generationThe Beat Generation is a term used to describe a group of American writers who came to prominence in the 1950s, and the cultural phenomena that they wrote about and inspired...
, or Beatniks, followed in the 1960s by the hippies and anti-vietnam war protesters.
The term 'counterculture' came to prominence in the news media as it was used to refer to the social revolution that swept
North AmericaNorth America is the northern continent of the Americas, situated in the Earth's northern hemisphere and in the western hemisphere. It is bordered on the north by the Arctic Ocean, on the east by the North Atlantic Ocean, on the southeast by the Caribbean Sea, and on the west by the North Pacific...
,
Western EuropeWestern Europe is the collection of countries in the westernmost region of Europe, though this definition is context-dependent and carries cultural and political connotations. One definition describes Western Europe as a cultural entity—the region lying west of Central Europe...
,
Japanis an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, People's Republic of China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
,
AustraliaAustralia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the continental mainland , the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans...
and
New ZealandNew Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses , and numerous smaller islands, most notably Stewart Island/Rakiura and the Chatham Islands. The indigenous Māori named New Zealand Aotearoa, commonly translated as The Land of the Long White Cloud...
during the 1960s and early 1970s.
Sixties and seventies counterculture
In the
United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, the counterculture of the 1960s became identified with the rejection of conventional social norms of the 1950s. Counterculture youth rejected the cultural standards of their parents, especially with respect to racial
segregationRacial segregation is the separation of different racial groups in daily life, such as eating in a restaurant, drinking from a water fountain, using a washroom, attending school, going to the movies, or in the rental or purchase of a home. Segregation may be mandated by law or exist through social...
and initial widespread support for the
Vietnam WarThe Vietnam War or the Second Indochina War was a Cold War military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1959 to 30 April 1975...
.
In the
United KingdomThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a sovereign state located off the northwestern coast of continental Europe. It is an island country, spanning an archipelago including Great Britain, the northeastern part of Ireland, and many small islands...
, the counterculture of the 1960s was mainly a reaction against the post-war social norms of the 1940s and 1950s, although "Ban the Bomb" protests centered around opposition to nuclear weaponry.
As the 1960s progressed, widespread tensions developed in American society that tended to flow along generational lines regarding the war in Vietnam, race relations,
sexual moresThe sexual revolution encompasses the changes in social thought and codes of behaviour related to sexuality throughout the Western world.-Overview:...
, women's rights, traditional modes of authority, and a materialist interpretation of the
American DreamThe American Dream is a national ethos of the United States of America in which democratic ideals are perceived as a promise of prosperity for its people...
. White, middle-class youth — who made up the bulk of the counterculture — had sufficient leisure time to turn their attention to
social issuesSocial issues are matters which directly or indirectly affect many or all members of a society and are considered to be problems, controversies related to moral values, or both....
. These social issues included support for
civil rightsCivil and political rights are a class of rights and freedoms that protect individuals from unwarranted government action and ensure one's ability to participate in the civil and political life of the state without discrimination or repression....
, women's rights, and
gay rightsLesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender social movements share inter-related goals of social acceptance of sexuality and gender minorities. Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people and their allies have a long history of campaigning for what is generally called LGBT rights, also called gay...
movements, and a rejection of the
Vietnam WarThe Vietnam War or the Second Indochina War was a Cold War military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1959 to 30 April 1975...
.
HippieThe hippie subculture was originally a youth movement that began in the United States during the early 1960s and spread around the world. The word hippie derives from hipster, and was initially used to describe beatniks who had moved into San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury district...
s became the largest countercultural group in the United States. The counterculture also had access to a media eager to present their concerns to a wider public. Demonstrations for social justice created far-reaching changes affecting many aspects of society.
Rejection of mainstream culture was best embodied in the new genres of
psychedelicThe term psychedelic is derived from the Greek words ψυχή and δηλείν , translating to "mind-manifesting". A psychedelic experience is characterized by the perception of aspects of one's mind previously unknown, or by the creative exuberance of the mind liberated from its ostensibly ordinary fetters...
rock musicRock music is a genre of popular music that entered the mainstream in the 1960s. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, rhythm and blues, country music and also drew on folk music, jazz and classical music....
, pop-art and new explorations in spirituality. Musicians who exemplified this era include The Grateful Dead,
Jefferson AirplaneJefferson Airplane was an American rock band formed in San Francisco in 1965. A pioneer of the psychedelic rock movement, Jefferson Airplane was the first band from the San Francisco scene to achieve mainstream commercial and critical success....
,
The KinksThe Kinks are an English rock group categorised in the US as a British Invasion band. The Kinks have been cited as one of the most important and influential rock bands of the British Invasion era....
,
Jimi HendrixJames Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix was an American guitarist, singer and songwriter...
,
The DoorsThe Doors were an American rock band formed in 1965 in Los Angeles, California by vocalist Jim Morrison, keyboardist Ray Manzarek, drummer John Densmore, and guitarist Robby Krieger. They are considered a controversial and influential band, due mostly to Morrison's cryptic lyrics and unpredictable...
,
CreamCream is a dairy product that is composed of the higher-butterfat layer skimmed from the top of milk before homogenization. In un-homogenized milk, over time, the lighter fat rises to the top. In the industrial production of cream this process is accelerated by using centrifuges called "separators"...
,
Pink FloydPink Floyd were an English rock band who, in the late 1960s, earned recognition for their psychedelic and space rock music, and in the 1970s, as they evolved, for their progressive rock music. Pink Floyd's work is marked by philosophical lyrics, sonic experimentation, innovative album cover art,...
,
The Rolling StonesThe Rolling Stones are an English rock band formed in 1962 in London when multi-instrumentalist Brian Jones and pianist Ian Stewart were joined by vocalist Mick Jagger and guitarist Keith Richards. Bassist Bill Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts completed the early lineup...
,
Led ZeppelinLed Zeppelin were an English rock band formed in 1968 by Jimmy Page , Robert Plant , John Paul Jones and John Bonham . With their heavy, guitar-driven sound, Led Zeppelin are regarded as one of the first heavy metal bands, helping to pioneer the genre...
,
The BeatlesThe Beatles were an English rock band formed in Liverpool in 1960 who became one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed bands in the history of popular music...
,
Bob DylanBob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet and painter who has been a major figure in popular music for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was, at first, an informal chronicler and then an apparently reluctant figurehead of social unrest...
,
Janis JoplinJanis Lyn Joplin was an American singer, songwriter and music arranger, from Port Arthur, Texas. She rose to prominence in the late 1960s as the lead singer of Big Brother and the Holding Company and later as a solo artist...
,
The Velvet UndergroundThe Velvet Underground was an American art rock band formed in New York City, New York. First active from 1965 to 1973, their best-known members were Lou Reed and John Cale, who both went on to find success as solo artists...
and
NicoNico was a German singer-songwriter, fashion model, actress, and Warhol Superstar...
. The pop-art culture led by
Andy WarholAndrew Warhola , more commonly known as Andy Warhol, was an American painter, printmaker, and filmmaker who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art...
also played a part in social change in the United States by redefining what art was and what made it valuable. Warhol's mass-produced monographs and silk-screens, such as the iconic
Campbell's Soup CansCampbell's Soup Cans, which is sometimes referred to as 32 Campbell's Soup Cans, is a work of art produced in 1962 by Andy Warhol. It consists of thirty-two canvases, each measuring in height × in width and each consisting of a painting of a Campbell's Soup can—one of each of the canned soup...
, challenged the notion that art is only about certain subjects (i.e., wealthy patrons or pretty landscapes), or that art is a singular creation. An entire generation's liberal views about
artArt is the process or product of deliberately arranging elements in a way that appeals to the senses or emotions. It encompasses a diverse range of human activities, creations, and modes of expression, including music, literature, film, sculpture, and paintings...
and drugs found prominent expression in Warhol's paintings, films, and music. Sentiments were also expressed in the song lyrics and popular sayings of the period, such as 'do your own thing,' '
turn on, tune in, drop out"Turn on, tune in, drop out" is a counterculture phrase coined by Timothy Leary in the 1960s. The phrase came to him in the shower one day after Marshall McLuhan suggested to Leary that he come up with "something snappy" to promote the benefits of LSD. It is an excerpt from a prepared speech he...
,' 'whatever turns you on,' '
Eight miles high"Eight Miles High" is a song written by Gene Clark, Jim McGuinn, and David Crosby, first released as a single in March 1966 by the rock band The Byrds. The single reached #14 on the Billboard Hot 100, and #24 in the United Kingdom. The song was also included on the band's third album Fifth...
,' and
'light my fire.' Spiritually, the counterculture included interest in
astrologyAstrology is a group of systems, traditions, and beliefs which hold that the relative positions of celestial bodies and related details can provide information about personality, human affairs, and other terrestrial matters. A practitioner of astrology is called an astrologer...
, the term "
Age of AquariusThe Age of Aquarius is the new age in the astrological cycle. Each astrological age is approximately 2,000 years long, on average, but there are various methods of calculating this length that may yield longer or shorter time spans depending upon the technique used...
" and knowing people's signs (
Sun SignsIn astronomy, the zodiac is the ring of constellations that lines the ecliptic, which is the apparent path of the Sun across the sky over the course of the year. The Moon and planets also lie within the ecliptic, and so are also within the constellations of the zodiac. In astrology, the zodiac...
). This led Theodore Roszak to state "A (sic) eclectic taste for mystic, occult, and magical phenomena has been a marked characteristic of our postwar
WWIIWorld War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a majority of the world's nations, including all great powers, organized into two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
youth culture since the days of the beatniks" (1968).
The counterculture in the United States reached its peak between 1966 and the early 1970s. It eventually waned for several reasons: mainstream America's disdain for unrepentant hedonism and conspicuous drug use, and the troubles caused by these excesses; the untimely death of many notable countercultural figures; the end of the Vietnam War; and the end of Civil Rights protests following passage of remedial legislation. The counterculture continues to influence social movements, art and society in general.
Counterculture literature
The counterculture of the 1960s and early 1970s generated its own unique brand of notable literature, including comics and cartoons, and sometimes referred to as the
underground pressThe phrase underground press is most often used to refer to the independently published and distributed underground papers associated with the counterculture of the late 1960s and early 1970s in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, and other western nations...
. This includes the work of
Robert CrumbRobert Dennis Crumb , often credited simply as R. Crumb, is an American artist and illustrator recognized for the distinctive style of his drawings and his critical, satirical, subversive view of the American mainstream...
and
Gilbert SheltonGilbert Shelton is an American cartoonist and underground comix artist. He is the creator of The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers, Fat Freddy's Cat, Wonder Wart-Hog, Not Quite Dead, and the cover art to The Grateful Dead's 1978 album Shakedown Street.He graduated from Lamar High School in Houston...
, and includes
Mr. NaturalMr. Natural may refer to:* Mr. Natural , an album by The Bee Gees** "Mr. Natural" , a song by The Bee Gees from that album* Mr. Natural , a comic book character drawn by Robert Crumb...
; Keep on Truckin';
Fritz the CatFritz the Cat is a comic strip created by Robert Crumb. Set in a "supercity" of anthropomorphic animals, the strip focuses on Fritz. A smooth feline con artist, he frequently finds himself in wild adventures, often involving a variety of sexual experiences...
;
Fat Freddy's CatFat Freddy's Cat is a fictional orange tomcat nominally belonging to Fat Freddy Freekowtski, one of the Freak Brothers, a trio of hippies who are featured in Gilbert Shelton's underground comix...
;
Fabulous Furry Freak BrothersThe Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers are a trio of underground comic strip characters created by the U.S. artist Gilbert Shelton. Their first comic book appearance was in Feds 'n' Heads, published by Berkeley's Print Mint in 1968. In 1969 Shelton and three friends from Texas founded Rip Off Press in...
; the album cover art for
Cheap ThrillsCheap Thrills is the second album from Big Brother and the Holding Company and their last album with Janis Joplin as primary lead vocalist.- Record history :...
; and contributions to
International TimesInternational Times was an underground paper founded in London in 1966. Editors included John Hopkins, David Mairowitz, Pete Stansill, Barry Miles, Jim Haynes and playwright Tom McGrath...
,
The Village VoiceThe Village Voice is a free weekly newspaper in New York City, United States featuring investigative articles, analysis of current affairs and culture, arts reviews and events listings for New York City...
, and
Oz magazineOz was first published as a satirical humour magazine between 1963 and 1969 in Sydney, Australia and, in its second and more famous incarnation, became a "psychedelic hippy" magazine from 1967 to 1973 in London. Strongly identified as part of the underground press, it was the subject of two...
. During the late '60s and early '70s, these comics and magazines were available for purchase in 'head shops' along with items like beads, incense, cigarette papers, tie-dye clothing, DayGlo posters, books, etc.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual & transgender counterculture
The
Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & TransgenderLGBT is an initialism referring collectively to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people. In use since the 1990s, the term “LGBT” is an adaptation of the initialism “LGB” which itself started replacing the phrase “gay community” which many within LGBT communities felt did not represent...
community (commonly abbreviated as the "LGBT" community), mostly evident in North America, Western Europe, Australasia and South Africa, fits the definition of a countercultural movement as "a cultural group whose values and norms of behavior run counter to those of the social mainstream of the day."
At the outset of the 20th century, homosexual acts were punishable offenses in these countries. The prevailing public attitude was that homosexuality was a moral failing that should be punished, as exemplified by
Oscar WildeOscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was an Irish playwright, poet and author of numerous short stories and one novel. Known for his biting wit, he became one of the most successful playwrights of the late Victorian era in London, and one of the greatest "celebrities" of his day...
’s 1895 trial and imprisonment for "gross indecency." But even then, there were dissenting views.
Sigmund FreudSigmund Freud , Sigismund Schlomo Freud , was an Austrian neurologist who founded the psychoanalytic school of psychology...
publicly expressed his opinion that homosexuality was a perfectly normal condition for some people.
According to Charles Kaiser’s
The Gay Metropolis, there were already semi-public gay-themed gatherings by the mid-1930s in the United States (such as the annual
dragDrag in its broadest sense means any clothing one wears. However, the traditional use of the term is for any costume or outfit that carries symbolic significance. This usually refers to the clothing associated with one gender role when worn by a person of the other gender...
balls held during the
Harlem RenaissanceThe Harlem Renaissance refers to the flowering of African American cultural and intellectual life during the 1920s and 1930s. At the time, it was known as the "New Negro Movement", named after the 1925 anthology The New Negro edited by Alain Locke...
). There were also
barsA gay bar is a drinking establishment that caters to an exclusively gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender clientele; the term gay is used as a broadly inclusive concept for LGBT and queer communities...
and
bathhousesGay bathhouses, also known as gay saunas or steam baths , are places where men can go to have sex with other men. Not all men who visit such bathhouses consider themselves gay regardless of their sexual behavior...
that catered to gay clientele and adopted warning procedures (similar to those used by
ProhibitionProhibition of alcohol, often referred to simply as prohibition, is a sumptuary law which prohibits alcohol. Typically, the manufacture, transportation, import, export, and sale of alcoholic beverages is restricted or illegal. The term can also apply to the periods in the histories of the countries...
-era
speakeasiesA speakeasy was an establishment which illegally sold alcoholic beverages during the period of United States history known as Prohibition...
) to warn customers of police raids. But homosexuality was typically subsumed into
bohemianBohemianism is the practice of an unconventional lifestyle, often in the company of like-minded people, involving musical, artistic or literary pursuits, with few permanent ties...
culture, and was not a significant movement in itself.
Eventually, a genuine gay culture began to take root, albeit very discreetly, with its own styles, attitudes and behaviors and industries began catering to this growing demographic group. For example, publishing houses cranked out pulp novels like
The Velvet UndergroundThe Velvet Underground is a paperback by journalist Michael Leigh that reports on sexual paraphilia in the USA, published in September, 1963.Cover text: Here is an incredible book. It will shock and amaze you...
that were targeted directly at gay people. By the early 1960s, openly gay political organizations such as the
Mattachine SocietyThe Mattachine Society was one of the earliest lasting homophile organizations in the United States, founded in 1950. The Society for Human Rights in Chicago predated the Mattachine Society, but was shut down by the police after only a few months....
were formally protesting abusive treatment toward gay people, challenging the entrenched idea that homosexuality was an aberrant condition, and calling for the decriminalization of homosexuality. Despite very limited sympathy, American society began at least to acknowledge the existence of a sizable population of gays. The film
The Boys in the BandThe Boys in the Band is a 1970 American drama film directed by William Friedkin. The screenplay by Mart Crowley is based on his off-Broadway play of the same title...
, for example, featured negative portrayals of gay men, but at least recognized that they did in fact fraternize with each other (as opposed to being isolated, solitary predators who "victimized" straight men).
The watershed event in the American gay rights movement was the 1969
Stonewall riotsThe Stonewall riots were a series of spontaneous, violent demonstrations against a police raid that took place in the early morning hours of June 28, 1969, at the Stonewall Inn, in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of New York City...
in New York City. Following this event, gays and lesbians began adopting the militant protest tactics used by
anti-warOpposition to United States involvement in the Vietnam War is significant because it was the first time a war was shown and accessed through the media to the public in the United States.-1945:...
and
black powerBlack Power is a political slogan and a name for various associated ideologies. It is used in the movement among people of Black African descent throughout the world, primarily African Americans in the United States...
radicals to confront anti-gay ideology. Another major turning point was the 1973 decision by the
American Psychiatric AssociationThe American Psychiatric Association is the main professional organization of psychiatrists and trainee psychiatrists in the United States, and the most influential worldwide. Its some 38,000 members are mainly American but some are international...
to remove homosexuality from the official list of mental disorders. Although gay radicals used pressure to force the decision, Kaiser notes that this had been an issue of some debate for many years in the psychiatric community, and that one of the chief obstacles to normalizing homosexuality was that therapists were profiting from offering dubious, unproven "cures".
The
AIDS epidemicThe history of HIV/AIDS in the United States began in about 1969, when HIV likely entered the United States through a single infected immigrant from Haiti...
was initially an unexpected blow to the movement, especially in North America. There was speculation that the disease would permanently drive gay life underground. Ironically, the tables were turned. Many of the early victims of the disease had been openly gay only within the confines of insular 'gay ghettos' such as New York City’s
Greenwich VillageGreenwich Village , often simply called "the Village", is a largely residential neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City. A large majority of the district is home to upper middle class families. Greenwich Village, however, was known in the late 19th – earlier to mid 20th...
and San Francisco’s Castro); they remained closeted in their professional lives and to their families. Many heterosexuals who thought they didn't know any gay people were confronted by friends and loved ones dying of ‘the gay plague.’ The LGBT community were increasingly seen not only as victims of a disease, but as victims of ostracism and hatred. Most importantly, the disease became a rallying point for a previously complacent gay community. AIDS invigorated the community politically to fight not only for a medical response to the disease, but also for wider acceptance of homosexuality in mainstream America. Ultimately,
coming outComing out of the closet, or simply coming out, is a figure of speech for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people disclosing their sexual orientation and gender identity...
became an important step for many LGBT people.
In 2003, the United States Supreme Court officially declared all
sodomySodomy is a term used today predominantly in law to describe the act of anal intercourse, oral intercourse, or bestiality.- Definitions :...
laws unconstitutional. Annual
gay prideLGBT pride or gay pride is the concept that lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people should be proud of their sexual orientation and gender identity...
events take place throughout the US and the world. Many of the current debates at the forefront of the LGBT community, such as
same-sex marriageSame-sex marriage is a term used to describe a legally or socially recognized marriage between two persons of the same biological sex or social gender. Other terms used to describe this type of recognition include gay marriage or gender-neutral marriage.Same-sex marriage is a civil rights,...
and parenting) would have been unthinkable even 20 years ago. As of 2007, the gay community is focusing on marital rights, although sufficient numbers of Americans oppose gay marriage to the point that 27 state constitutional amendments banning gay marriage have been passed by comfortable popular margins of 60–80%. This indicates that despite the wider acceptance and tolerance of homosexual life, it is still viewed by mainstream American society as an aberration, making it in every sense one of several contemporary 'countercultures'.
Russian/Soviet counterculture
Although not exactly equivalent to the English definition, the term "Контркультура" (
Kontrkul'tura, "Counterculture") found a constant use in Russian to define a cultural movement that promotes acting outside usual conventions of Russian culture: use of explicit language, graphical description of sex, violence and illicit activities and uncopyrighted use of "safe" characters involved in everything mentioned.
During the early '70s, Russian culture was forced into quite a rigid framework of constant optimistic approach to everything. Even mild topics, such as breaking marriage and alcohol abuse, tended to be viewed as taboo by the media. In response, Russian society grew weary of the gap between real life and the creative world. Thus, the folklore and underground culture tended to be considered forbidden fruit. On the other hand, the general satisfaction with the quality of the existing works promoted parody, often within existing settings. For example, the Russian anecdotal joke tradition turned the settings of
War and PeaceWar and Peace , a Russian novel by Leo Tolstoy, is considered one of the world's greatest works of fiction. It is regarded, along with Anna Karenina , as his finest literary achievement....
by
Leo TolstoyLeo Tolstoy, or Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy , was a Russian writer widely regarded as among the greatest of novelists. His masterpieces War and Peace and Anna Karenina represent in their scope, breadth and vivid depiction of 19th-century Russian life and attitudes, the peak of realist...
into a grotesque world of sexual excess. Another well-known example is black humor (mostly in the form of short poems) that dealt exclusively with funny deaths and/or other mishaps of small, innocent children.
In the mid-'80s, the
Glasnostwas the policy of maximal publicity, openness, and transparency in the activities of all government institutions in the Soviet Union, together with freedom of information, introduced by Mikhail Gorbachev in the second half of 1980s....
policy allowed the production of not-so-optimistic creative works. As a consequence, Russian cinema during the late '80s to the early '90s was dominated by crime-packed action movies with explicit (but not necessarily graphic) scenes of ruthless violence and social dramas on drug abuse, prostitution and failing relations. Although Russian movies of the time would be rated R in the USA due to violence, the use of explicit language was much milder than in American cinema.
Russian counterculture as we know it emerged in the late '90s with the increased popularity of the Internet. Several websites appeared that posted user-written short stories that dealt with sex, drugs and violence. The following features are considered the most popular topics for such works:
- Wide use of explicit language;
- Deliberate bad spelling;
- Drug theme: Descriptions of drug use and consequences of substance abuse;
- Alcohol use: Negative portrayals;
- Sex and violence: Nothing is a taboo — in general, violence is rarely advocated, while all types of sex are considered to be a good thing;
- Parody: Media advertising, classic movies, pop culture and children's books are considered to be fair game;
- Nonconformance to daily routine and set nature of things; and,
- Politically-incorrect topics: Mostly racism
Racism is the belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race. In the case of institutional racism, certain racial groups may be denied rights or benefits, or get preferential treatment...
, xenophobiaXenophobia is a dislike and/or fear of that which is unknown or different from oneself. It comes from the Greek words ξένος , meaning "stranger," "foreigner" and φόβος , meaning "fear." The term is typically used to describe a fear or dislike of foreigners or of people significantly different from...
and homophobiaHomophobia is defined as an "irrational fear of, aversion to, or discrimination against homosexuality or homosexuals", or individuals perceived to be homosexual; it is also defined as "unreasoning fear of or antipathy toward homosexuals and homosexuality", "fear of or contempt for lesbians and gay...
.
A notable aspect is the influence of the contra-cultural developments on Russian pop culture. In addition to traditional Russian styles of music, such as songs with jail-related lyrics, new music styles with explicit language were developed.
Asian counterculture
In the recent past Dr.
Sebastian KappenSebastian Kappen , was a renowned Indian Jesuit priest and Theologian.-Formation and studies:...
, an Indian theologian, has tried to redefine counterculture in the Asian context. In March 1990, at a seminar in Bangalore, he presented his countercultural perspectives (Chapter 4 in S. Kappen,
Tradition, modernity, counterculture: an Asian perspective, Visthar, Bangalore, 1994).
Dr. Kappen envisages counterculture as a new culture that has to negate the two opposing cultural phenomena in Asian countries:
- invasion by Western capitalist culture, and
- the emergence of revivalist movements.
Kappen writes, "Were we to succumb to the first, we should be losing our identity; if to the second, ours would be a false, obsolete identity in a mental universe of dead symbols and delayed myths".
The most important countercultural movement in India had taken place in the state of West Bengal during the 1960s by a group of poets and artists who called themselves Hungryalists.
See also
- Exy
The Exis were a youth movement in Hamburg, Germany, in the 1950s. The Exis took their name from the existentialist movement, and were influenced by its chief proponents, Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus. There are similar German nicknames for other movements, such as "Sozis" and the "Nazis"...
- Dialectic of Enlightenment
Dialectic of Enlightenment , is the core text of Critical Theory explaining the socio-psychological status quo that had been responsible for, what the Frankfurt School considered, the failure of the Enlightenment.Written by Frankfurt School philosophers Max Horkheimer and Theodor W...
- La Movida Madrileña
La Movida Madrileña was a countercultural movement that took place mainly in Madrid during the Spanish transition after Francisco Franco's death in 1975...
- Punks
- Radicalization
Radicalisation or Radicalization is the transformation from passiveness or activism to more revolutionary, militant or extreme postures...
External links