Zoom Memes for Self-Quaranteens: Generational Humor, Identity, and Conflict During the Pandemic

The objective of this study is to examine young adults’ perceptions of the pandemic. This study is based on a content analysis of memes posted on one of the most popular emerging–adult-focused Facebook groups established during the pandemic. It finds that three themes emerged: pandemic humor, generational identity humor, and generational conflict humor. Memes about the pandemic include sub-themes of a coming apocalypse, adults who deny the seriousness of COVID-19, and a more general expression of negative feelings, particularly anger and fear, through humor. Posts also emphasize the existence of a shared generational identity through humor, with commonly understood references to issues like online learning, productivity, and mental health. Finally, generational conflict humor emphasizes antagonism with older generations, including mistrust of government and political leaders, professors, and universities.

Perceptions of Generational Conflict Among Three Age Groups in South Korea

After rapid industrialization during the past few decades, the gap between generations in South Korea has widened and the issue of generational conflict is being discussed as a social problem (Chung & Lim, 2018). The purpose of this study is to find out how each generation perceives generational conflict in the areas of family, politics, economy and social welfare, and culture. An online survey of 1,000 adults aged 20 and over was conducted nationwide in South Korea in January, 2021 with three age groups: the youngest group aged 20-39, mid-age group of 40- 64 and the oldest group of 65 and over. The questionnaire was created using the items developed by a previous research that used a Delphi technique (Chung, 2020). Participants answered how serious they perceive generational conflict in the dyadic relationship on 5-point Likert scales. Descriptive statistics were calculated, and t-tests have been performed to see the generational differences. Results show that the youngest group and the oldest group perceive the highest level of generational conflict each other in the areas of culture and politics. In cultural aspects, ‘use of slang among the same group’, ‘Ability to utilize digital devices’ were the items that had the highest level of conflict. In the political realm, progressive vs. conservative ideology was the area of the highest conflict. In addition, t-test results showed that the oldest group perceived generational conflict even deeper than the youngest group in the ‘economy and social welfare’ and cultural areas. Implications of these findings are discussed.

"Friend / Foe" - intergenerational relationships between Russian historians of the first quarter of the XX century.

The article is devoted to the analysis of intergenerational relations of historians of the late XIX early XX century and young historians, students of the Institute of Red Professors. On the example of the text of the review by A.A. Kizevetter for a collection of works by young historians edited by M.N. Pokrovsky highlighted the key problems through which the conflict of generations of historians is revealed within the scientific community of the first quarter of the twentieth century. The first problem is that A.A. Kiesewetter, like other historians of the older generation, assessed the young generation of historians through the prism of a personal attitude towards M.N. Pokrovsky, hence the negative attitude towards the works of historians. The second problem is the disagreement with young researchers in assessing the activities of historians of the senior school. The third is the inaccuracy in the interpretation of historical sources and, most importantly, the categorical nature of young historians. According to A.A. Kiesewetter, young researchers lacked the critical thinking necessary when working with historical material. Pre-revolutionary historiography was rejected as obsolete. The situation of the socio-cultural crisis and the revolution of 1917 created the basis for the formation of a generational conflict. The pre-revolutionary system of evolutionary development and conflict-free transfer of experience was destroyed, and as a result, dialogue between generations did not work out. Each of the generations tried to prove its own significance in scientific activity.

Dressed in Sheep’s Clothing: Pastoral and Reform in Spenser’s A View of the Present State of Ireland

This study investigates the presence of pastoral themes in Spenser’s prose dialogue, A View of the Present State of Ireland (c. 1596). Tracing the traditional pastoral themes of generational conflict, degeneration, and regeneration in Spenser’s late pastorals, this study considers how Spenser’s inclusion of these pastoral themes shape paradigms of reform in the View. It argues that generational conflict is exacerbated in the colonial space where degeneration is pervasive threatening both the self and the social structure of the English colonial project in Ireland. These connections to pastoral themes suggest that Spenser and his colonial peers, such as Lodowick Bryskett, conceive of their lives in pastoral terms intersected with imperial politics.

Talking About (My) Generation

This chapter engages with several major themes that have long animated research on the West German 1960s: protesters’ family backgrounds and wartime childhoods; the meaning of the Nazi past to their activism; and intergenerational relations. Like their student peers on the Left, centre-right activists had been raised in a post-genocidal society. Given that, how did they view and engage with Germany’s recent history of mass violence? The chapter highlights the centrality of anti-totalitarianism to their thinking. It also shows that, inspired by the so-called ‘‘45ers’ and nudged by social scientists who routinely portrayed student protest as a symptom of generational conflict, they began to think of themselves as a distinct generational community in the 1960s.

Ideology

This chapter looks in depth into the Soviet hippie belief system, while, at the same time, noting the absence of a unified ideology, whose very existence hippies rejected for themselves. It begins with an exploration of the indebtedness of hippie beliefs to the rituals and practices of official Soviet youth culture, highlighting both similarities and differences to Western hippie thought. It then proceeds to discuss common hippie tropes such as freedom, love, peace, and generational conflict with reference to the Soviet case, concluding that there was a lot of ideological overlap between the fundamental messages of communist socialization and the global hippie creed, which indeed had its very roots in the same left-wing, utopian thinking as early Soviet revolutionary ideas. While this ‘boomerang’ effect of radical, communitarian thinking unsettled the Soviet authorities, it also meant that Soviet hippies remained true to their socialist upbringing and world view shaped by late socialism in the very rebellion they staged against the system.