This book examines the emergence of modern working-class youth culture through the perspective of an urban history of post-war Britain, with a particular focus on the influence of young people and their culture on Britain's self-image as a country emerging from the constraints of its post-Victorian, imperial past.

Each section of the book Society, City, Pop, and Space considers in detail the ways in which working-class youth culture corresponded with a fast-changing metropolitan and urban society in the years following the decline of the British Empire.

Was teenage culture rooted in the urban experience and the transformation of working-class neighbourhoods? Did youth subcultures emerge simply as a reaction to Britain's changing racial demographic? To what extent did leisure venues and institutions function as laboratories for a developing British pop culture, which ultimately helped Britain re-establish its prominence on the world stage?

These questions and more are answered in this book.

Examines the emergence of modern working-class youth culture through an urban history of post-war Britain Shows how working-class youth grappled with urban society after the decline of the British Empire Explores the influence of British youth and their culture on the nation's post-colonial self-image

Autorentext

Felix Fuhg is Research Associate at the Center for Metropolitan Studies at the Technical University Berlin, Germany.

Inhalt

1. Introduction.- PART I: SOCIETY.- 2. 'Vulgar Nincompoops' and 'Sawdust Caesars': Generations, adolescence, and the historicity of youth culture in post-war debates.- 3. 'First I Look At The Purse': Youth at work.- PART II: CITY.- 4. Mods, working-class youth and London's way of becoming a modern post-war metropolis.- 5. Working-class youth and the social transformation of post-war London.- PART III: POP.- 6. Making Britain great again: Popular culture and the British invasion.- 7. Cultural renewal and the transnational fashion industry.- PART IV: SPACE.- 8. The creation and use of public space.- 9. Leisure venues: London by day and by night.