The True Nature of the Victorian Society - Assignment Example

What do moral panics concerning youth tell us about Victorian Society? Victorian England has been one of the most significant societies which is d for the moral panics concerning youth and a profound understanding of the youth culture, moral panics and popular music in Victorian Britain is effective in suggesting the specific characteristics of the society during this period. Commonly noted as a period of great changes, the Victorian period, the years between 1837 and 1901 under the rule of the great Queen Victoria, was also a time of moral panics. The youth culture, moral panics and popular music in Victorian Britain tell us about the nature of social life in the period and it is generally accepted as an age of high morality. There are also significant criticisms against the shams and fake morality of the period which is suggested by the phrase the Victorian morality. The realities concerning prostitutes and other moral evils of the period also help one realize the true nature of the Victorian society. However, the period is more important for the development of a new youth culture and British youth movements which gave priority to new codes of conduct and rules of living. Therefore, the values of the Victorian society are closely associated with the youth culture, popular music and the moral panics concerning the youth. The youth culture of the Victorian society was also connected with the class system and youth movements of the period. In an investigation of the sociological history of the Victorian Britain, one comes to comprehend the factors which contributed to youth culture and moral panics concerning youth in the period. Moral panic concerning youth has become a major topic in the modern times, though it was started in the Victorian period. “It is widely acknowledged that this is the age of the moral panic… In one sense moral panics are nothing new. For a century and more there have been panics over crime, and the activities of ‘youth’ in particular have often been presented as potentially immoral and a threat to the established way of life.” (Thompson, 1) Therefore, moral panics concerning youth in the Victorian period have been a central topic of discussion in the sociological perspective of history and this paper undertakes a reflective analysis of the youth culture, music, and moral panics concerning youth in the Victorian Britain from the point of view of history. In the modern studies on moral panics, no other age group is more closely linked with it than the youth and the Victorian Society’s concern for the moral panics among the youth is often illustrated as an example for such analyses. Due to the significant development of the sociological analysis of moral panics in Britain, the central focus has fallen on youth cultures. In fact, it has been contributed by the sociological analyses that the youth are considered as at risk as well as a source of risk in many moral panics. The transitional status of this age group also explains why the youth are regarded as at risk of moral panics and the dwelling in a position between childhood and adulthood itself offers reasons for worry to the youth. The marginality and ambiguity of its status corresponds to the risks for moral panics associated with youth. “Youth presents a problem for social regulation and the reproduction of the social order. But the relationship between the generations and generational cultures is also problematical for young people themselves, and youth cultures and subcultures can be read or decoded as responses and attempted solutions to those strains.” (Thompson, 43) These explanations being general to the youth culture of every period, the risk for moral panics associated with youth during the Victorian period was much higher. Though there are several criticisms leveled against the concept of ‘moral panics’, this theory has been used to determine the nature of youth in the Victorian period and it has been understood as a problem with deviance and morality. Significantly, “moral panics define for society the moral parameters within which it is acceptable to behave, and marginalize and punish those groups who step outside those parameters, but rarely do they encourage examination of the reasons why the group is behaving in that way in the first place.” (Jewkes, 77) The major portion of the moral panic literature it is a presupposed assumption that the youth groups are inevitably economically marginalized and turn to crime and deviance. Group identity of the youth culture was a statement of style and status to the Victorian youth. The existence of the spectacular youth subcultures in the Victorian society was the stock in trade of moral panic promoters. “Moral panic theory tends to suggest that young people have restricted choices in their statements of style, personality and consumption.” (Jewkes, 79) One of the specific examples of moral panics concerning youth in the Victorian society was the increase in the cases of venereal diseases in the period. The society, from time to time, has expressed deep fears about the moral constitution of youth and it is not surprising that the Victorian society was one such. The sociologists in the 1970s constructed some of these fears as moral panics. “Yet there is nothing new about episodes of threat, crisis, fear, panic, and the varied responses to these in society. One could draw up a considerable list: for example, the plague in the Middle Ages, venereal diseases in Victorian times, the nuclear threat in the cold-war era…” (Besley, 119) In this analysis of the youth culture and moral panics associated with youth during the Victorian period it is essential to understand the role of the youth movements in the development of youth culture. Such youth movements are highly willing to admit unlimited number of adolescence, young adults or youth in order to propagate a particular code of living, i.e. the culture of that particular group. One of the most identifiable characteristics of the youth culture of the Victorian society is the abundance of such youth movements which helped in the spreading of a culture. The British youth movements have made significant contributions to the development of youth culture and they recruit unlimited number of members in the particular generation. In an analysis of their historical significance and potential influence in the British society, it becomes lucid that the British youth movements have been a central contributor to the youth culture of the period. “Youth movements do not claim the rather solemn attention of the historian simply because of the many thousands of boys and young men who have enlisted as members of such organizations. Over the past century, they have also functioned as extremely sensitive barometers of shifts in public and governmental attitudes towards the military in British society. In addition, youth movements acted as indicators of the general demographic, cultural and economic conditions conducive to the recognition and institutionalization of adolescence that were just beginning to come into existence around the turn of the century.” (Springhall, 13-14) The question regarding whether or not the youth movements in Britain are characterized by a ‘hegemonic’ relationship between the leaders and the followers poses one of the essential historical issues. Another significant consideration concerning these youth movements in England is whether they may be regarded as a suitable measure to a higher social status. “In general, the last decades of the nineteenth century and the first of the twentieth - which saw the arrival of all the major British youth movements – were a period of increasing economic and social uncertainty in Britain.” (Springhall, 14) Therefore, it becomes lucid that the British youth movements made a significant contribution to the development of a youth culture during the Victorian period in England. In a sequence of backward glances through English social history, one realizes the role of class distinction in the misinterpretation of youth and the moral panics about youth. In fact, significant theorists of social history have offered important insights regarding the contributions made by social class distinction in the representation of the youth as a major threat to social safety. The Edwardian and Victorian England was plagued by the un-English hooligan in the 1890s and the studies by social historians such as Pearson have alerted the people to central continuities in a history of ‘respectable fears’. According to Pearson, there is an important consistency in the recognition of the youth as a cause of social problems and in the nature of dominant culture’s denunciation. The preoccupations with youth disorder are not exactly about crimes alone; instead, more importantly, these are invariably associated with wider social tensions. “Moral panics about youth are characteristically the surface manifestation of deeper concerns which revolve around the place and passivity of the working class. For example, the original Edwardian hooligan was part of a much wider debate of the boy labor ‘problem’ and their moral degeneration in dead-end jobs. This in turn signified a growing concern over urban degeneration and national decline at the turn of the century. Analysis of ‘moral panics’ and ‘crime waves’ tells us more of the condition and stability of society at particular historical moments than it does of any particular incidents called ‘crime’.” (Franklin, 184) Therefore, the moral panics about youth during the Victorian period need to be realized naturally as the surface manifestation of deeper concerns which surround the place and passivity of the working class. In the Victorian period, England was one of the most important working-class nations of the world and this class was always concerned with occupation, wages, and work. “Throughout this period the working classes were a large, though slowly declining majority of the English people: they made up 78.29 per cent of the whole population in 1921, 78.07 per cent in 1931 and 72.19 percent in 1951. This represented about 30.2 million people in 1921 and nearly 32 million in both 1931 and 1951. These overall figures, however, conceal important changes within the composition of the working classes.” (McKibbin, 106) The class distinction of the people was influential in the development of a particular culture to every class. The lower class youth developed a popular culture of its own which was served by the growth of popular music and youth movements in the Victorian society. Similarly, the growth of popular music also caused the expansion of a particular moral code and cultural law for the youth culture. “To most middle class Victorians it was axiomatic that music should be more than a mere artistic experience or a form of amusement.” (Russell, 17) The growth of a youth culture in the Victorian society is, therefore, closely associated with the development of popular music and the progress of a new morality to the youth. In an understanding of the popular music of the period, one realizes that the fashionable music during the Victorian period contributed heavily to the development of a youth culture. The three most essential processes that were operating within the popular music of the period were expansion, diversification, and nationalization and these processes are closely connected with the social and moral development of a youth culture in the period. “There was clearly a huge expansion in musical activity of all types, as even the most random set of statistics illustrates. The number of musicians and music masters’ recorded in the census returns increased from nineteen thousand in to forty-seven thousand in 1871 to forty seven thousand in 1911... The pace of expansion seems to have been broadly similar across the whole field of musical life: steady from about 1845 to 1875, rapid from that date and reaching a peak in the 1890s.” (Russell, 1) Therefore, there was enormous development in the field of popular music during the Victorian period which is closely connected with the youth culture of the period. Youth culture in the Victorian society was immensely influenced by the progress of the popular music and there have been significant marks of class distinction in the development of the culture. Music was always an important element or a popular component in the various schemes which were used by the reformers in social and moral renewal through ‘rational recreation’. The definite capacity of the music in touching the emotions of the people, it was a central tool in the shaping of people’s thought and actions. Therefore, the Victorian society sought to bring about cultural renewal of the youth through music. There were also attempts to relate music with religion. Thus, there arose a mass of activity that embraced singing classes, temperance bands, popular concerts and music festivals all over the country in the Victorian period. “Throughout the period up until 1914, much of this music for the people, as later Victorians eventually christened it, centred on the middle-class wish to destroy the potentially dangerous elements within working-class culture and to create a respectable, self-reliant, collaborationist working class... The aspects of popular culture under attack varied according to circumstance. The period 1840 to 1914 saw relationships between classes and the issues which structured these relationships change considerably and music for the people reflected these changing preoccupations.” (Russell, 17-18) Therefore, it becomes lucid that the youth culture of the Victorian period was mainly influenced by popular culture of the time including the progress in the popular music. In an understanding of the moral panics concerning youth in the Victorian Society, these influences seem highly significant and there is an essential connection among the youth culture, moral panics and popular music in Victorian Britain. In conclusion, the moral panics concerning youth in the Victorian period have been a central topic of discussion in the sociological perspective of history and it is important to realize that the youth culture, music, and moral panics concerning youth in Victorian Britain are closely connected. The role of youth movements in the Victorian Society has been central in the spreading of the youth culture developed as a result of the popular culture, music and the specific condition of the class distinction. This reflective analysis of the youth culture, music, and moral panics concerning youth in Victorian Society, therefore, concludes that there is essential relationship among these aspects of the life of the youth in the age and only a socio-historic perspective can be useful in assessing such critical topics. Works Cited Besley, Tina. Counseling youth: Foucault, power, and the ethics of subjectivity. Sense Publishers, 2006. P 119. Franklin, Bob. Social policy, the media and misrepresentation. London: Routledge. 1999. P 184. Jewkes, Yvonne. Media and Crime. SAGE. 2004. P 77. McKibbin, Ross. Classes and Cultures: England 1918-1951. London: Oxford University Press. 2000. P 106. Russell, Dave. Popular Music in England, 1840-1914: A Social History. McGill-Queens Press – MQUP. 1987. P 1. Springhall, John. Youth, Empire, and Society: British Youth Movements, 1883-1940. Taylor & Francis. 1977. P 13-14. Thompson, Kenneth. Moral Panics. London: Routledge. 1998. P 43. Read More