Goths, Gamers, and Grrrls: Deviance and Youth Subcultures Book

"There are surely people and practices that you find strange. Even stranger, though, is how we often have different ideas regarding what is strange."--from the Introduction

How and why do subcultures emerge? Do youth subcultures mount a meaningful resistance to mainstream/adult society? How do men and women enact gender in their scenes? What does it mean to be "deviant"? Who decides what is deviant and what is "normal"?

A concise, engaging, and affordable supplementary text for introductory sociology courses and any course that covers popular culture, youth, or deviance, Goths, Gamers, and Grrrls: Deviance and Youth Subcultures addresses these questions and many more. This unique volume introduces students to the sociological study of deviance, equipping them with the theoretical tools necessary to analyze various youth subcultures--and virtually any subculture--in new and fascinating ways.

Author Ross Haenfler opens with an introduction that provides an overview of subcultural theory, a definition of the concept of resistance, and explanations of various theories of deviance and delinquency. He goes on to examine eight different youth subcultures in depth: skinheads, punk rock/hardcore/straight edge, hip hop, heavy metal, virginity pledgers, Goths, gamers and hackers, and riot grrrls. Each chapter begins with a brief description and history of the scene before exploring a specific sociological concept or theory. Topics addressed include symbolic interactionist theory, status hierarchy, the role of style and politics in music scenes, enacting race and gender, moral panics, positive deviance, social stigma, the components of a virtual subculture, and more. The book concludes with discussions of resistance, commodification, and what happens as subcultural youth age.