Introduction

This introduction investigates why and how the tradition of youth culture studies has pushed collectivity and collective phenomena to the margins – and how these phenomena have nevertheless asserted themselves inside this tradition. It delivers a brief sketch of the field and its major ‘schools’, contouring theoretical backgrounds and epistemic shifts, while focusing on how changing theoretical assumptions have constructed and performed – and in periods blocked – the access to youth culture’s collective aspects. It then introduces the contributors to this volume. The chapters fall into two parts. Whereas the first group of contributors relate to a concept of collectivity of neo-Durkheim provenance, the second group wishes to draw into the collective the material culture of young lives. The volume ends with an afterword by French sociologist Michel Maffesoli.