College was the end goal through my entire education to this point. First it was a matter of getting here, then going through the system to get where I am now. I will graduate. I even have a job secured for after I graduate. But all I have ever known is how to be a student. This post-bacc life is a completely new role for me, and, through the media I consume, I think it's also a confusing time for my contemporaries. There are so many pressures on people in their early twenties to both enjoy these years of youth and also behave like "adults." But what does it mean to be an adult? There's an entire YouTube channel dedicated to answering the question "How to Adult?" There really seems to be no answer.
In my musings, I have concluded that I am living in a society with a very strong youth culture. This has been characteristic for decades: think of the twentysomething hippies of the '60s, the disco dancing and bell bottom wearing youth of the '70s, and the strong trends before and after those iconic decades. I am part of the generation shaped by the internet, Harry Potter, 9/11, rising technologies, and unlimited access to media. My youth culture is centered around fandoms, nerdiness, loving things, and sharing that love IRL and online. I am connected to my contemporaries via phone, text, e-mail, facebook, blog, tumblr, YouTube. My generation are bloggers, vloggers, writers, musicians, artists...and everything can be self-produced and distributed online. It's a great time to be young. But how can I maintain the identity I formed within this culture as I age?
As a sociologist, I'm going to theorize. Looking at the way my parents still use language from their youths, the way hippies never really stop being hippies, the way my elders still have a strong emphasis on family and country (relics of the first half of the twentieth century youth cultures), and the fact that there are people decades older than me who still engage in fan culture, I predict that the platforms my generation use will grow and change with us. I don't foresee an end to self-producing music, vlogging, blogging, tumbling, and connecting via facebook. I don't think an Exploding TARDIS poster is necessarily going to be lauded as valuable and mature wall art, but it will not be outlandish for it to hang in my apartment. At least I hope not; I really like that poster.
I have formed an identity through the culture of my youth. I don't want to give that up to become a "proper adult."I don't think I have to, and that's pretty cool. Sure, I'll have to start being responsible for myself in new, adult ways, but I'm realizing that the perceived pressures to have everything figured out and behave in the ways people two or three times my age are modeling as "adulthood" are not necessary or even real. I may not carry my TARDIS mug into work on the first day, but I will certainly continue to use it. (All my examples are TARDISes. I have 11 of them. It's the most relevant fandom item.)
I guess there's no real conclusion here. I can still be me and an adult. Just the employed, independent version of me who goes to the grocery store and tests the waters before publicly carrying her button collection (There. It's not a TARDIS. Well, not exclusively.). And I think that the things that define my generation are going to grow with us and be replaced by new things for the next generation of youth. There is going to be a youth culture after mine. I have no earthly idea what that will look like, but I know that it will be identity-forming for those who live it.
Today is awesome because I'm back to blogging, I have a JOB, and I'm starting to ease the cognitive dissonance of identity that comes with graduation.
(shhh. I know it's 19 days into BEDA. I'm obviously not participating this year. I have a con and five tech weeks coming up.)
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