The Rise and Fall of the American Teenager

by Thomas Hine

Book Overview

In the groundbreaking work, Thomas Hine examines the American teenager as a social invention shaped by the needs of the twentieth century. With intelligence, insight, imagination, and humorm he traces... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0380728532
• Release Date: September 2000
• Publisher: Harper Perennial
• Length: 336 Pages
• Weight: 0.68 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.0" x 0.8" x 5.3"

Customer Reviews

Death to Teenagers; Long live Young Adults!

The American concept of teenagers is explored in a history spanning 400 years by Thomas Hine in his book: The Rise and Fall of the American Teenager. Hine quotes diaries, sermons, newspapers, histories, and other non-fiction to detail the evolution of "The Teenager" beginning with the first settlers and ending with goths lounging in Disneyland. Past eras treated "those aged 13-18" differently due to varying social and economic circumstances. The experience of a Lowell, Mass. Maiden during Industrialization is vastly different from the experience of 1920s newsie, and both are different from the the post-WWII, high-school-attending teen. Hine gives very detailed accounts of young peoples' lives in different eras of US History to support his assertion that "the Teenager" is now an alienating, potentially damaging social construct. In colonial and pre-industrialized eras, youth labor was vital to household economies, individual psycho-social development, and the functioning of communities. For example, in the 18th and 19th centuries, youth were treated differently according to their abilities, sexual maturation, and experience. Large, sexually mature men were given men's work at a devalued wage. Young women, during Industrialization, were called upon to work in textile factories. Currently, teens can only work in supportive service jobs at minimum wage. The wage devaluation remains intact but the implicit trust in a teen's abilities to handle anything resembling adult work is gone. Hine analyzes the philosophic underpinnings of socially delayed maturation, and the consequences of this approach. Teens are discouraged from experimenting with employment, sex and alcohol, meanwhile the time allotted for the being a teen lengthens. Marriage, sex, and pregnancy-- behaviors that were normal for teens in past eras-- are now considered failings of families and society. Drinking and smoking have evolved from a childish rite of passage to misdemeanor crimes. Instead of being "risky," teens are segregated in bureaucratic educational institutions and their adulthood is infinitely delayed. Currently, many Americans in their mid-20s are considered too young for full-time employment and marriage. These YAs' brash disregard for WWII-era morality concerning sex, marriage, drinking, and drugs is tolerated by their boomer parents (who didn't necessarily conform to their parents' ideals either), but "being adult" still creates friction between the generations. Hine argues that the concept of the teenager is a mythical concept that has been so distorted that it is now only harmful, and no longer useful, to our society. Teens today have no physical space to interact, and moreover, they are treated to unchecked adult suspicion. Teen unemployment and delayed employability have been steadily rising, and yet the age in which a teen can be treated as a criminal has dropped considerably. Steve Harmon, an imprisoned, 16-year-old ruefully and ironically acknowledges this dicho

Wow.

I could not put this book down once I began reading it. It was entertaining, informative, and really made me question the way teenagers are classified today. The amount of both freedom and responsibility granted to younger adults in earlier generations is amazing in comparison to the idleness and lack of direction granted to them today. I'm fascinated by the evolution of the high school--beginning as an actual *useful* place for building work skills and as a replacement for college and how it has evolved into a glorified babysitting service that regurgitates information. I recommend this book to anyone wanting to learn the varied places of youth in America across history.

American Teenager ...review

Tom Hine's book, The Rise and Fall of the American Teenager, perceptively traces the 3-century history of younger people (those in their teen years) in Colonial and 18th century times, and on to the creation of the "teenager," as a result of post World War I growth of high schools. Throughout Hine chronicles how these younger people have been distrusted and viewed with panic by adults. The decline of the teenager, Hine says, is shown by high school tribalism, with numerous cults and subcults, silently posing in public, but communicating with no one but themselves. This is a witty and valuable book, one that should be in the library of every American parent. -- Forrest R. Pitts, Prof. of Geography (Emeritus)

A must

Anyone who wants to understand the American teenager or American culture of the 20th century must read this book. Essential to any student of anthropology, archaeology, sociology, architectural history or popular culture. Extraordinary insights which reflect a remarkable and creative understanding of our own history and place in time.

A very enlightning book.

The information presented in this book is very interesting in that it explains a lot of what I went through in my own teen years as well as what my two children went through in theirs, and what my grandson has faced and the others will face. At this present moment I believe everyone, especially news reporters should be made aware of the contents of this book. My son, a Police Officer, has found the informaiton helpful, and my wife a school teacher has found this to be true also.