A counterculture is a culture whose values and norms of behavior differ substantially from those of mainstream society, sometimes diametrically opposed to mainstream cultural mores.[1][2] A countercultural movement expresses the ethos and aspirations of a specific population during a well-defined era. When oppositional forces reach critical mass, countercultures can trigger dramatic cultural changes. Countercultures differ from subcultures.
Prominent examples of countercultures in the Western world include the Levellers (1645–1650),[3] Bohemianism (1850–1910), the more fragmentary counterculture of the Beat Generation (1944–1964), and the globalized counterculture of the 1960s which consisted primarily of Hippies and Flower Children (ca. 1965–1975, peaking in 1967). Regarding this last group, when referring to themselves, counterculture will usually be capitalized and is often hyphenated as: Counter-Culture or Counter-culture.[4]
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
MWebsterwas invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Eric Donald Hirsch. The Dictionary of Cultural Literacy. Houghton Mifflin. ISBN 0-395-65597-8. (1993) p. 419. "Members of a cultural protest that began in the U.S. In the 1960s and Europe before fading in the 1970s... fundamentally a cultural rather than a political protest."
- ^ Outhwaite, William, ed. (2008). "Counterculture". The Blackwell Dictionary of Modern Social Thought (2nd ed.). Malden: John Wiley & Sons. p. 120. ISBN 9780470999011. Retrieved November 10, 2020.
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