Thornton

Thornton begins her essay by describing a night out in the London club scene, bouncing from club to party to rave. Though her account seems somewhat distant from the culture, her descriptions are illuminating and preface her following evaluation of subcultures in the 1990s. She continues with a section on youth subcultures, tracing the recent history of varying theories and meta-theories that separate the field of cultural studies into their analyses of mainstream/alternative, and similar dichotomies. In this, Thornton seems to reject the traditional binaries for an expanded set of relationships she views as necessary in the 1990s, citing the observation of Grossberg that "the mass audience of pop, the mainstream of style, is the postmodern subculture" [p97]. Personally, I find this ridiculous, but she keeps going.

The following section, "The Social Logic of Subcultural Capital," Thornton discusses the social umbrella of the 'mainstream,' and what that designation suggests about class, age, scene, and status. Her argument is that the mainstream, though having multiple definitions, is something against which adolescents and young adults can differentiate themselves in order to carve out a social niche based on freedom and leisure, rather than structure and occupation; the mainstream exists as something they acknowledge and reinforce by simultaneously responding to, or rebelling against, its (seemingly omni-)presence. She concludes by discussing the gender differences in cultural capital and how these affect the composition of both the mainstream and subcultures.

Thornton concludes with a rather specific, yet uncaptivating, description of her methodologies in observing the British club scene. More relevant, in mind, is in her final conclusion, which provides not only a brief summary of her argument, but an explicit list of the social binaries that construct the larger positions of "us" and "them."

Discussion question(s): Individually, what are overlapping qualities between mainstream and underground cultures, if any? Style? Rebellion? Virtuosity? Beyond this, if cultures beneath the mainstream are formed via continual undermining of cultural authority (age, race, class, etc.), from where does subcultural authority emerge? How is it maintained, or can it be? Or does it even exist?