No more heroes: portuguese punk and the notion of subculture in the global south

• Type: Chapter or Part of a Book
• Date: 2024

Authors

Guerra, Paula (Author) FLUP

Book

Title: Interpreting subcultures: approaching, contextualizing, and embodying sense-making practices in alternative cultures

Pages: 59-74

ISBN: 978-1-5292-1864-0

Publisher: Bristol University Press

Indexing

Crossref

Other information

DOI: 10.2307/jj.9421085.9

Abstract (EN): This chapter is based on two main objectives: to provoke a transdisciplinary approach to the study of subcultures by facilitating the encounter between sociology and cultural studies that has remained historically far away; and to provide a critical application of the concept of subculture outside its Anglo-American comfort space in the context of Portugal—a country in Southern Europe that starts from a sociohistorical position of modernity that is radically different from the central hegemonic context. When we launched ourselves into the study of youth cultures more than a decade ago, the question we asked was: ‘And after Hebdige?’ It is undeniable that many of Hebdige’s (1979) positions have not aged particularly well—often because of the ‘holes’ identified in our previous research works. But this statement is, above all, a privilege that comes from knowing the end of the story—or, more correctly, from having already had access to some of the ‘scenes from the following chapters’. We are talking about a theoretical perspective that has taken its positions politically, endowing itself with a transdisciplinary theoretical and methodological source that, even today, makes many of those espousing the current transdisciplinary research rhetoric blush: nowadays, the word ‘punk’ denotes not so much a specific subculture or style of music, but commodification and incorporation of this juvenile subculture by the mainstream; consequently, it has been deprived of its original critical force.

Language: English

Type (Professor's evaluation): Scientific