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2. The dramaturgical metaphor of scene,
invokes the appropriation of youth cultures
as stages, in the sense of Goffman. On
these stages, some young people construct
their identities, perform specific social roles,
and act for daily audiences, trying to catch
their attention: more than to say, to be seen
becomes the most effective way of youth
being present, today, in the public sphere.

3.  The first, located in a confined space and time,
correspond to random and more or less spontaneous
actions, without any kind of transformative reflexivity. It
corresponds to rebellious conducts typical of the period of
adolescence and youth, often naturalised as being a part
of its process of growing up and gaining autonomy.
 The latter, suppose an oppositional conscience that seeks
to break with or win over a position, considering the
relations of power, the foundations of social control and
the figures of authority. Presume practices with the
conscience of the personal and social effects that may
arise from them. Also presumes the display of an open
ideological condemnation of repressive ideologies.

4.  Far from the idealist and holistic devotion of some youth
movements from the 70’s and 80’s, nowadays youth
scenes there is no utopian social programme (such as that
of the hippie movement, for example), nor even a
dystopian programme (such as that of the punk
movement), to guide its practices of resistance, in the
sense of expressing a collective imagination of a «better
society» or an «ideal society».
 Current youth scenes expresses a heterotopic ambition of
deviance (Foucault, 1984 [1967]). More than struggling for
being equal, the action of youth scenes is guided towards
the recognition and the improvement of conditions of
coexistencial pluralism, a moral disorder expressed
through the existence of multiple moralities, even though
frequently conflictive among themselves.

5.  The transformative reflexivity that defines
the political culture of current youth scenes
is no longer associated with the collective
demand for universal political, human or
social rights.
 It does include, now, the claim for
particularistic cultural rights, in the sense of
the improvement of individual freedom to
create and to try new aesthetic and ethical
models of lifestyle.

6.  More than the struggle for equity, these expressions
display a struggle for subjectivity, as it was point out
by McDonald (1999). That is, a struggle related not to
demands for social equality and redistribution, but
rather for space of self-defining and social
recognition of singularities.
 Its political content should be understood not in the
traditional framework of the universality of citizenship
rights – which assumes the same set of civil liberties
and responsibilities for everyone – but in a framework
of affirmation of the individual. The political intention
is found not only in the recognition of oneself as a
citizen with equal rights, but in one’s particularities as
a person.

7.  The social actions are no longer interested in acting
upon the world, expression of annihilating practices,
that is, practices that offer a possibility of changing
the world, activating strategies to destroy the
«existing social order» and replacing it for a new.
 They are more interested on acting on the world,
their actions configure predatory practices. That is,
practices which take advantage of the resources
and spaces socially available for young people
statements’ in the world, trying to defy the
boundaries of cultural expression and personal
creativity. Presume that young people want to take
advantage of the world as much as they can, and to
take the best it has to offer.

8. In contrast with the holistic and militant
logic of collective contestation which
characterised some youth movements of
the past, the convivial solidarities of youth
cultures are mostly organized around an
ethics of celebration. In contrast with
combative ways of living life, this ethics
presumes a constant search for the festive
side of existence, as a display of vitality and
creative energy.

9.  Presumes the mobilization of aesthetic
practices and stylistic resources that seek
possibilities of expression and recognition of
a subjectivity self-perceived as singular,
authentic and free.
 Also presumes the struggle for space and
recognition of lifestyles that intends to
escape the socially saturated formulas
currently available in the «style
supermarket», and to celebrate and take
advantage of life in the best what it gives.

10. Vitor Sérgio Ferreira
Institute of Social Sciences | University of Lisbon