Sgt. Pepper, 3/18

For some reason, the thing I'm most fascinated with in Hebdige's discussion of subculture and ideology are the subcultures that attempt to challenge hegemony. He talks about the dirty subculture of the Sex Pistols and mentions the mods, the punks, etc. These are examples of a current ideology in America of going against the grain and being different from everyone else. Unpopular is the new popular. It made me think of one of my friends from home, and his obsession with being the first one to find out about a certain band or movie. Because once it becomes mainstream, it's not as cool. I hate that, and it's especially prevalent with people my age. As high school and college students are constantly trying to "find themselves," we're definitely the most affected by the mass media's control over hegemony. I, too, want to break the ideologies hegemony is forcing and get back to a true system of democracy.

So, the soul-searching teenager might ask, "How can I completely avoid hegemony and the ideologies it's throwing at me?" And the answer is that you can't. Hegemony surrounds us so completely that it's near impossible to avoid. The idea of thoughts or actions being "innate" almost seems arbitrary after reading this article. With such strong hegemonic spells being cast, there are few decisions we make that are completely our own.

We can take small steps though. For instance, and someone else mentioned this in their post too, one of the most notable outcomes of hegemony in our culture are the distinct gender roles. One of my previous professors, though, told us about his 5-year-old son, and how he and his wife have decided to encourage any gender-specific actions or ideas. It will be interesting to see how it works out.