Doing – Undoing – Redoing? the Everyday Representation of Gender Patterns in Youth Scenes

Rockabilly, Sport Climbing and Visual Kei are three (youth) scenes which, at first glance, could not be more different – be it in terms of activities, habits of (self-)presentation or the scenes’ geographic origin. However, the three scenes also have something in common: they all are global-historic movements which are adapted, transformed and interpreted within local contexts of present modern societies. Moreover, as youth-scenes, Rockabilly, Sport Climbing and Visual Kei are conceptualized within the context of individualized, popularized and globalized societies, as a prototype for post-traditional forms of social affiliation due to the dissolution of traditional forms of social affiliation, particularly youth scenes offer a new type of operational framework in which individuals can pursue their interest for a common topic; regardless of their social background. This, commonly hedonistic quest for pleasure, involving only a minimal amount of self-commitment makes scenes attractive for a variety of social agents. Most notably, they offer an opportunity for them to meet like-minded people.

The question, to which extent gender-arrangements are affected in this context of hedonistic enjoyment, has not been systematically studied, yet. The research-project “Scenes, a Prototypical Social Field for (Re-) Negotiating Gender Arrangements?” will attend to this research gap. Initial findings will be presented. In doing so, we will discuss the question in how far gender-patterns are reactualized, ironized, questioned, tested, denied or even traditionalized in these three scenes. In this regard, we consider group-discussions the best method to (a) inquire gender-patterns and -arrangements that dominate and are considered self-evident within the field and to (b) capture their linguistic legitimization. Our goal is to facilitate a deeper understanding as to the question if, or in which way, scenes are a prototypical field for (re-) negotiations of gender-arrangements.