Intergenerational conflict and authentic youth experience: adults denigrating young people

This book explores how the youth experience, viscerally felt and deeply ingrained at a time of substantial physical, psychological and emotional changes, serves to authenticate that youth experience to the exclusion of that of ensuing youth generations. Using Cohen’s concept of moral panic to frame the intergenerational conflict, notions of generational exclusivity and authenticity are explored through Bourdieu’s concept of habitus – how each generation privileges its own youth experience as the ‘standard’ by which other youth generations can be judged. Shared authenticated ‘generational understandings’ act as the benchmark by which ensuing youth generations can be assessed and found wanting. Intergenerational conflict has been brought into sharp focus by the emergence of the Millennial generation, digital natives, with their obsession with digital technology and particularly mobile phones. The book will be of interest for the field of youth studies in general, particularly upper-level undergraduate youth studies courses and postgrads and social scientists.