Redefining the subcultural:

the sub and the cultural

Erik Hannerz

Arguing against the previous research’s presumption that the subcultural

constitutes a single set of meaning, this article addresses the simple
question of what constitutes the subcultural? What does it mean when we
address an object, practice, identity, or meaning structure as subcultural?
Through outlining three dominant strands in regards to how subcultural
difference has been defined, the author argues that the previous
research on subcultural theory has been preoccupied with a definition
of subcultures as being a response to external structural problems, with
the result that both the “sub” and the “cultural” become dependent
variables. Drawing from his work on punks in Sweden and Indonesia the
author argues that although differing, the different strands in regards to
subcultural difference can nevertheless be combined into a refinement
of subcultural theory that moves beyond style to how objects, actions,
and identities are communicated, interpreted, and acted upon. Such a
refinement, the author argues, provides for an analysis of plurality within
the subcultural in relation to multiple structures of meaning. An increased
focus on the prefix sub and its relation to the root cultural allows for a
discussion of how the subcultural is symbolically extended and more so,
how this involves both conflict and alternative interpretations.

Keywords: mainstream, punk, scene, subcultures, subcultural theory

Erik Hannerz, research fellow, Department of Sociology, Lund

University.
[email protected]

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Introduction
There are in fact no masses; there are only ways of seeing people as
masses. [...] What we see, neutrally, is other people, many others, people
unknown to us. In practice, we mass them, and interpret them, according
to some convenient formula. Within its terms, the formula will hold. Yet
it is the formula, not the mass, which it is our real business to examine (R.
Williams 1960:319).

In his book on subcultural theory, Patrick Williams (2011) argues

that instead of just applying the term “subculture” to classify groups
and social networks, we need to approach subcultures as a cultural
phenomenon based on a shared meaning. Although I agree with
Williams, the fact that he feels compelled to make such a claim is
more revealing than the actual statement: The theoretical developments
that have marked the concept of subculture during its seventy years
of existence within social sciences have done little to strengthen the
concept’s applicability. Instead the concept of subculture has largely
become reduced to what Andy Bennett calls “a convenient ‘catch-all’
term for any aspect of social life in which young people, style and music
intersect” (1999:599). Part of this is due to the increasing terminological
inflation of the last three decades with concepts such as “communities,”
“underground,” “neo-tribes,” “post-subcultures,” “club-cultures,” and
“scene” often being used simultaneously and interchangeably with that
of “subculture,” without clarifying the difference between them (cf.
Fox, 1987, Lull 1987, Thornton 1995, O’Connor 2002). It is in the
light of such a development that Williams’s call for a cultural approach
to subcultures should be seen. Williams’s point is that if theoretically
clarified, the concept of subculture can very well be used alongside for
example “scene,” the latter to capture a social and vernacular aspect of
subcultural participation and interaction, whereas “subcultures” refer
to a cultural and theoretical aspect (2011:33ff).
Accordingly, in this article, my point of departure will be the simple
question: What constitutes the subcultural? What does it mean when we
address an object, practice, identity, or meaning structure as subcultural?
Second, how does the prefix “sub” relate to the root “cultural”? In other
words, how are differences and similarities structured? Third, I want
to explore the potential plurality of the subcultural, that there can be

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multiple definitions within the same subculture. Not only in terms of

what the subculture is and should be, but also in regards to what it
is not and what it should be separated from; what is in subcultural
theory addressed as the mainstream. I start by outlining three dominant
strands in subcultural theory in regards to difference, arguing that
although subcultural difference is differently approached, it has
similar consequences for how subcultural authenticity and subcultural
meaning are approached. I argue that this is due to a preoccupation with
subcultures as being a response to external structural problems rather
than as having a relatively autonomous structure of meanings. The
result of the former is that it renders both the “sub” and the “cultural”
as dependent variables, that emphasis has been on style rather than
meaning, and that the potential plurality of subcultural meaning
becomes a theoretical blind spot: we cannot see that we cannot see
it. In relation to this, I make use of the Durkheimian distinction
between the sacred and the profane, to point to the subcultural as best
understood as a meaning-focused, deeply existential boundary work
between a differentiated sacred whose purity must be protected against
a profane and profaning undifferentiated mainstream. Drawing from
the empirical findings of my previous work on punks in Sweden and
Indonesia, I provide a definition of the subcultural that relates to a
structuring of both similarities and differences among participants as
to how the subcultural and the mainstream are defined, interpreted and
lived out. I refer to this as a matter of different subcultural positionings
of the mainstream, one pointing to what is external to the subcultural,
the other to a mainstream conceived of as internal to the subcultural.
In so doing, I show that such a definition of the subcultural does not
have to stray far from previous subcultural theories.

Subcultural difference
If there is one unifying trait throughout the development of subcultural
theory, it is that subcultures are articulated as different from the
conventional or normal, termed as the mainstream in later works
on subcultures. How this difference is approached, however, differs
significantly: For the major part of its existence within sociology,
subcultural theory has centered on difference as being ascribed. Such

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an idea of subcultural participants as being already different due to

their class position, ethnicity, age, or to spatial dimensions can be
traced from the seminal work on the urban, deviant, and lowbrow
conducted by the Chicago school in the early 20th century. Among
others (cf. Thrasher 1927, Cressey 1932), Robert E. Park (1915) argues
that the physical geography of the city—in terms of its advantages
and disadvantages, and its proximities and distances—gives rise to
social groups being physically delineated by ascribed characteristics,
geography, vocation, or class. To Park, this gives rise to different
moral milieus within which each individual, including the deviants
and marginalized, can locate oneself, feel at ease, and develop and
pursue his or her individual dispositions. Hence, these moral worlds
constitute a means for an inclusion of marginalized individuals as well
as a means for solving problems associated with being marginalized.
Albert Cohen (1955) furthers this claim in his work on delinquent gangs
by suggesting that delinquency is a consequence of nonconformity in
the sense of a norm-guided rejection of societal goal. Based on the
assumption that all human action “is an ongoing series of efforts to
solve problems” (1955:50), Cohen’s definition of subcultures is equated
to their function to provide a solution to the inability to meet social
norms and aspirations by replacing them with an alternative morality
among others with similar problems and from similar circumstances.
The response, argues Cohen, is to invert the moral standards of the
larger society, making nonconformity a positive characteristic.
Even though it is highly critical of Cohen and in particular of
functionalism, the theoretical work of the Centre for Contemporary
Cultural Studies (CCCS) in Birmingham builds on a similar idea
of an ascribed difference as being the foundation for subcultural
formation. Following from a Marxist conception of culture as a way
of experiencing life, albeit in a way defined from an already given and
historical past, their major work Resistance Through Rituals (Clarke
et al. 1976) defines subcultures as ideological reactions to material
conditions experienced by the working class. Subcultures, this way,
emerge as a response of the working class youth to the struggle through
which the parent culture is defined and contained through the interests
of the dominant culture. The reference to subcultures as part of a
larger parent-culture also points to subcultures as the response to what

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Phil Cohen ([1972] 2007:539) refers to as a “generational conflict.”

Subcultural difference is thus ascribed not only on the basis of class
but also in terms of age, with the working class youth resisting the
dominant culture through consumerism—appropriating and subverting
commodities and their meaning while at the same time differentiating
themselves from their parents. Subcultural style, this way, becomes a
symbolic solution to material problems experienced within a hegemonic
order. Subcultural authenticity then becomes directly linked to this
ascribed difference from the dominant. Dick Hebdige (1979), for
example, argues that it is this initial difference from the dominant that
is the primary determinant of style, as well as the fundamental bearer of
subcultural meaning: Subcultures enact the search for and expression
of the forbidden aspects of the dominant—primarily a consciousness
of class. Consequently, for the CCCS subcultures become the signifier
of what cannot otherwise be signified, or as Hebdige has famously put
it, “Subcultures represent ‘noise’ (as opposed to sound): interference in
the orderly sequence” (1979:90). Similar to Cohen’s (1955) argument,
subcultural identities for the CCCS become a re-adjustment rather then
a maladjustment: a solution to problems encountered by the parent
culture yet lived out by the youth (cf. Gelder 2007:42, 89).
The second approach to subcultural difference retains the inversion
of the positive and negative ends of the conformist/nonconformist
binary and agrees that subcultures are fundamentally a matter of
solving problems. Yet, this approach argues that subcultural difference
is achieved rather than ascribed. Howard S. Becker (1963) argues, for
example, that subcultures are defined as arising in response to the
collective experience of problems, but this difference is not imposed on
participants, rather it is by choice: The isolation and self-segregation of
subcultural groups work to create boundaries to protect the subcultural
participants and defend the collective from outside interference
(1963:95f). For the jazz musician in Becker’s work this comes down
to choosing between conventional commercial success, or “to stay true
to artistic standards and then likely fail in larger society” (1963:83).
Becker’s focus on the maintenance of subcultural boundaries to
the commercial, as well as the individual participants’ strategies to
isolate and protect the creative and deviant, is crucial in understanding
the development of subcultural theory as centered around style and
commitment. The subcultural studies that ensued in the 1980s and

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1990s challenged the CCCS’s assumption of a stable and homogeneous

subcultural style. Michael Brake (1985:15), for example, points out that
subcultures are not static or homogeneous, but rather they include both
complexity and diversity. His argument is similar to Becker’s, although
Brake starts with the assumption that subcultural participants share the
same collective problem due to contradictions in the social structure.
Varieties in subcultural styles are for Brake then a consequence of
how these problems are lived out by the individual. This approach to
subcultures as being structured through an achieved difference also
represents a slight change in what the subcultural is opposing. Whereas
in the work of the CCCS, Becker, and Cohen subcultures are placed in
opposition to the dominant, normal, conventional or square, Brake’s
focus on the lived-out part of the subcultural places the subcultural as
juxtaposed to the mainstream (cf. Hebdige 1979:102). Further, following
from Becker’s claim of staying true to artistic standards, authenticity is
again tied to consistency throughout this difference, yet it is achieved
through commitment to maintaining the opposition to the mainstream.
As I argued above, for Hebdige, as well as for the rest of the CCCS
(cf. Clarke et al. 1976, Clarke 1976), subcultural authenticity lies in the
formation of style. This first “authentic” moment of resistance creates a
distinction between the “originals”—the “self-conscious innovators” to
whom style made sense—and the “hangers-on”—attracted by the mass
mediated defusion and diffusion of this meaning (Hebdige 1979:122).
Following the shift to approaching difference as being achieved rather
than ascribed, subcultural heterogeneity is instead ordered through the
extent to which participants resist the mainstream society. In relation to
punk, for example, James Lull (1987), Kathryn J. Fox (1987), Stephen
W. Baron (1989), and Lauraine Leblanc (1999) all argue that although
all participants share punk’s resistance to the dominant culture,
what differs is the consistency between behavior and punk beliefs:
To behave rightly is to prove commitment, and this in turn decides
the social positions within the subculture, making stylistic diversity
a matter of differences in commitment. The more radical style is in
relation to the mainstream, the more committed participants are said to
be. Subcultural difference to the mainstream is thus achieved through
radical hairstyles, tattoos, giving up school, housing and employment,
or through politics.

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The third approach to subcultural theory builds on subcultural

difference as achieved by the actions of subcultural participants, yet it
does so by calling into question the objective status of both difference
and the mainstream. This approach was largely initiated by postmodern
subcultural theorists critical of the previous subcultural research for
having constructed subcultural boundaries and authenticities, such
as Steve Redhead (1990, 1993). Redhead (1990:25, cf. Widdicombe
and Wooffitt 1995:19ff) proposes that authentic subcultures are a
product of subcultural theories focused on resistance. Similarly,
David Muggleton (2000:100f) argues that commitment as a basis for
stratification risks obfuscating individual interpretations of style. The
postmodern approach to subcultures and the call for a deconstruction
of the boundary between an innovative inside and an exploitive outside
resonate well with another major question of 1990s subcultural theory:
whether subcultures can be seen as existing independently from, and
in absolute opposition to, mass media and commercial interests. Ulf
Hannerz (1992) and Sarah Thornton (1995) both question the objective
status of the mainstream, as well as that of resistance. Thornton
(1995:116ff), for example, argues that subcultures do not rise and grow
mysteriously in isolation from the mass media (cf. Osgerby 2013).
Rather, she argues that the media is part of creating subcultures. Hence,
instead of presupposing a homogeneous conventional mainstream
that the subculture is different from, Thornton (1995), followed by
Muggleton (1997, 2000) and Ryan Moore (2005), argues that the
mainstream is merely a subcultural other used to differentiate between
the heterogeneous in-group and the homogeneous out-group, affirming
its own distinctive character. Subcultural difference, in this sense, is
neither ascribed nor achieved, but instead constructed and narrated
(Gelder 2007). Subcultural difference becomes a matter of taking
positions, of drawing boundaries between the conceived different and
the equally conceived undifferentiated. As Hannerz puts it, “subcultures
tend to be collectivized perspectives toward perspectives” (1992:78).
The stress on difference as narrated also marks a break with the
postmodern approach by focusing on the similarities that draw
participants together, rather than emphasizing difference, individuality,
and heterogeneity. Paul Hodkinson refers to this as a “cultural
substance” (2002:29); meanings and symbols might very well
differ between participants, as well as their reasons for subcultural

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participation in the first place, yet what ties these people together
is a shared set of values and tastes. This is how cultural substance
is contrasted to fluidity: through a focus on similarities rather than
differences in terms of style, identity, commitment, and relation to
the outside world. A central consequence of this perspective is the
break with the CCCS’s focus on youth, as subcultures as well as
their participants are increasingly addressed as ageing (cf. Hodkinson
2011, Bennett and Taylor 2012). Williams’ (2011) call for a cultural
approach to the subcultural that opened this article refines this narrated
difference further in addressing subcultural difference as a constructed
and narrated boundary that exists in the shared interaction and beliefs
among participants. This interaction among participants, however, is
still based on a shared similarity that gives rise to discursive structures
affecting how participants experience their world. Subcultural
authenticity is thus still tied to commitment, albeit not to a subcultural
core or resistance, but rather to subcultural identification. As Williams
(2011:9f) puts it, authenticity is an ongoing process that is negotiated
by individuals and groups.

The subcultural fallacy in regards to plurality

Building on the more recent developments in subcultural theory
outlined above, I want to address what is still lacking in subcultural
theory—that is, the failure to deal with plural mainstreams and plural
structures of meanings within the same subculture. Unsurprisingly,
this fallacy follows from how subcultural difference is defined: For
the CCCS (Clarke et al. 1976; Hebdige 1979) and Cohen (1955),
subcultures arise in order to solve a particular problem based on
general causes. Accordingly, what are investigated are the forms of
this reaction, as subcultural difference is ascribed a priori. Hence, the
particular problem gives rise to a particular form of resistance. When
plurality does appear it can similarly be dismissed as merely a sign
of the subculture’s destined decline due to the arrival of participants
whose ascribed status differs from that of the “original” members (cf.
Hebdige 1979:91, 103). Subcultural heterogeneity is thus explained
away in terms of maintaining a single subcultural core established in
relation to existing socio-economic structures, most often class (cf.
Worley 2013).

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Although the ensuing critique against the work of the CCCS focuses
on the restriction of the subcultural to the working class, the definition
of subcultural difference as achieved merely substitutes class with
commitment. Subcultural heterogeneity is effectively explained away
by pointing to a perceived consistency to a single authentic core. Punk
studies constitute a striking example of this: Baron (1989:299) notes,
for example, that the punk subculture is heterogeneous, and that the
rebel is but one attitude, the subcultural allowing for plural responses
to different goals and problems. However, on the same page he reduces
these differences to one single meaning in defining them as a matter of
different levels of commitment to resisting the dominant culture. Fox’s
(1987) distinction between core and peripheral participants based
on their commitment is another example of explaining differences
through a single uniform meaning. Fox differentiates here between
“hardcores,” who incorporate and embody punk as a permanent
way of life by endorsing a radical style and a rejection of ‘normal’
life, and “softcores,” who look the part but are not as ideologically
committed and loyal as the hardcores. Leblanc makes a similar
distinction, as she argues that “punk was, and is, about living out a
rebellion against authority” (1999:34), while simultaneously ordering
differences among the punks she studied by combining radical style
with subcultural commitment, stating that “punks with mohawks and
tattoos were deemed to be more committed to the scene than those who
had ‘convertible’ haircuts” (1999:86, cf. Wallach 2005). Even when
this stress on radical style is called into question, heterogeneities are
ordered in relation to a single subcultural path of development (cf.
Andes 1998, Dowd et al. 2004).
The third approach to subcultural difference breaks with the idea
of authenticity as equaling commitment, defining subcultural styles
and heterogeneities as a matter of fluidity and individuality. From
such point of view, differences among participants are addressed
first as a matter of style surfing and individual meaning (Muggleton
1997, Polhemus 1997) and second as the consequence of postmodern
conditions such as the hyperinflation of images (Muggleton 2000,
Clarke 2003). Collective differences among subcultural participants
are thus explained as remnants of different reactions to socio-economic
changes stemming from this postmodern condition (Moore 2004). The

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more recent development of subcultural difference as narrated is in part

a reaction to, and in part a continuation of, the work of postmodern
subcultural theorists. Retaining that the boundary to the mainstream
is constructed and far from fixed, internal differences are then linked
to individuality and personal strategies within a similarly shared
subcultural substance (Thornton 1997, MacDonald 2001, Hodkinson
2002, Williams 2011). Style is similarly tweaked as part of a process
that delineates the authentic and the inauthentic at the same time (Force
2009).
Counter to all of the above, my argument is that these differences,
both among theoretical approaches and among the participants in
their data, point to the impossibility of maintaining a single uniform
subcultural logic. Having said that, I now turn to how these approaches
can be combined so as to include heterogeneity in terms of how the
subcultural and what it opposes are structured.

The sub of the subcultural

Thornton (1997:4) notes that traditionally, the “sub” in subcultural
studies has referred to the subordinate, subaltern, and subterranean.
This particularly relates to the work on subcultures in which
participants are seen as included in “society” yet considered deviant
and thus beneath it. The definition provided by Clarke et al. (1976:13),
for example, is that the sub refers to subcultures as a part of larger
cultural structures. This definition of the sub harks back to the initial
definitions of subcultures as sub-societies (Green 1946, Gordon
1947), and remains an important implicit reference to the prefix sub as
embedded in a wider whole. Unsurprisingly, for much of the work that
followed from the CCCS, the sub has come to stand for the subversive
as in the rebellious and resistant, in line with a definition of difference
as achieved. The more recent work on subcultures adds to this in its
emphasis on how the distance from the mainstream is constructed and
communicated. Nancy MacDonald (2001) for example argues that the
prefix sub refers to a contrastive dimension used to define and separate
participants’ identities. Agency is then on the part of the participants,
that they construct, portray and perceive themselves as a boundaried
isolated group. The sub, MacDonald notes, is less a matter of being

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different from or beneath other groups, but rather of a constructed

separation. The sub, similar to authenticity, is thus being worked (cf.
Williams & Hannerz 2014).
In my work on how punks in Sweden and Indonesia define and make
sense of what punk is and should be, what it opposes, and what it should
be against (Hannerz 2013, 2015), I show how punks mobilize and
authenticate identities and styles through a boundary work that ensures
that the mainstream remains both different and out of reach of the
subcultural. Such an analysis draws from Hebdige’s (1979:102) claim
that a communicated and significant difference from the mainstream
constitutes “the ‘point’ behind” both the representation of the collective
as well as the division of the world according to this distinction between
the different and undifferentiated. Yet, instead of combining this with
the theories of Saussure and Gramsci, as Hebdige does, I suggest that
we look to Emile Durkheim’s (1915) idea of the foundation of religious
thought as a division of the world into a sacred and a profane domain.
Similar to how Durkheim speaks of the sacred and the profane as
interrelated—the sacred is set apart by collective ideals specifying what
must not come in contact with it—the mainstream and the subcultural
are thus treated as relational by definition. Such a perspective combines
Hebdige’s idea of difference as the point behind subcultural structuring
with Becker’s stress on the maintenance of a boundary to what is
perceived as threatening the subcultural, and finally with MacDonald’s
definition of the sub as a separation that is being continuously worked.
By analyzing how punks mobilize and authenticate styles and
identities, I point in total to six different definitions of the mainstream,
each referring to a particular articulation of the subcultural sacred
and with different consequences that enable some performances of
punk to be authenticated while limiting or excluding others (Hannerz
2015:196). Drawing from extensive fieldwork and interviews with
punks in nine different cities in two countries over the course of ten
years, I show that how the mainstream is defined, communicated,
and acted upon has direct consequences for how subcultural styles
and identities are mobilized. When the mainstream is defined as an
encompassing normal and undifferentiated outside, participants enact
a script of a shared sense of always having been different so as to, one

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the one hand, authenticate their own style and identities, and on the
other, to establish and strengthen the definition of, and separation to,
a mainstream characterized by a desire to be like everyone else. The
consequence is that conspicuous style and standing out are seen as
representative of the subcultural sacred: the consistency of an extrinsic
display to a communicated intrinsic difference. (Hannerz 2015: 39-54)
Such a mobilization of difference contrasts deeply with that of the
boundary to the mainstream as being worked internally to punk. This
definition of the mainstream refers to the shallow punks, obsessed
with conspicuous style and being different. This separation is in turn
established and strengthened through a script of development by which
the subcultural sacred is established as the conscious move beyond the
mere being of punk to becoming part of a collective depth. This involves
the active distancing from the shallow as participants invalidate their
own initial subcultural participation as something superficial and
embarrassing, so as to prove an achievement of depth. Authentications
of styles and identities thus concern an absence of style, articulating
dress and appearance as being practical and something that participants
are largely oblivious to (Hannerz 2015:85-99).
The introduction of the Durkheimian notion of the sacred and the
profane in relation to this communicated difference specifies that
the binary distinction between the subcultural and the mainstream is
not only meaningful, but that its structuring aspects penetrate social
structures and categorizations, specifying who is in and who is out
(Alexander 2006:569). It is this very differentiation that creates and
defines what constitutes the undifferentiated “others” from which the
subcultural is separated. Consequently, I want to refine the definition
of the mainstream so that it refers to the negative outcome of such
a perceived and portrayed difference, rather than being reduced to
everything that is not subcultural. Instead of dividing the world into
subcultural participants and a non-subcultural outside, the focus on the
communicated part of both the subcultural and the mainstream means
that the mirage of subcultural homogeneity can be abandoned, as focus
is on the contrastive dimension of the relationship to the mainstream,
rather than the mainstream as being something physically out there (cf.
Hannerz 1992:81).

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Further, if the mainstream is defined by the articulations of difference

that set the subcultural apart, it means that it negatively represents
such a distinctive status rather than everything that is not subcultural.
This brings an important aspect to the subculture/mainstream binary,
as prohibitions are not confined to ideological assumptions—e.g., the
mass media and commercial forces diluting the authenticity of the
resistance against the dominant—but rather refer to the formlessness
of the profane that is seen to threaten the sanctity of the form (Douglas
1966). Among the punks I followed, for example, the commercial was
differently defined and acted upon; whereas to some participants it was
defined as institutions outside of punk seeking to capitalize on punk
and turn it into another commodity, to others it was entirely kept within
punk and referred to bands and participants that desired individual
profit rather than a collective cause. Neither of these communicated
and acted upon the commercial in terms of an anti-capitalist or anti-
consumerist stance, but rather so as to order and secure the boundary
between the set apart sacred and the undifferentiated mainstream.
Different definitions of the mainstream thus gave rise to different
mobilization of actions, styles and identities. My point here is that
it is the same pattern of meaning that defines both the set apart and
the undifferentiated; in this sense, the mainstream can only be traced
by investigating how subcultural participants communicate their
difference. This way, the “sub” of the subcultural should be refined so
as to point not so much to a subset of meaning within something larger,
but rather to a defined subset of meanings that includes that which it
opposes. The subcultural defines the mainstream at the same time as
it communicates and portrays its separation from it. It constructs and
communicates what the undifferentiated others stand for. Rather than
being embedded in a larger whole, the “sub” refers to the embedding of
the mainstream in this distinction (Hannerz 2015:23). The mainstream
is thus disenthralled from an inherent meaning as “the outside,” but
also from a single meaning. Instead, it points to the mainstream as
belonging as much to the subcultural as does the articulated difference.
Having said that, I now want to move on to the similarities in structuring
subcultural heterogeneities.

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The cultural of the subcultural

Rather than centered on a single uniform core, the punk subculture in
both Sweden and Indonesia were held together by similarly structured
differences based on how the mainstream was positioned as either
internal or external to punk. These similar differences were sustained
regardless of participants’ gender, class background, ascribed ethnic
background, age and years of involvement (Hannerz 2015:81, 99). In
mapping out these differences, I show that an exploration of subcultural
meaning thus has to involve an examination of the subcultural formulas
of classification and interpretation through which objects, actions,
space, and identities are communicated, interpreted and acted upon.
Jeffrey Alexander and Philip Smith (2003:12) refer to this as the relative
autonomy of culture: to analytically separate the meanings from the
objects, investigating the supraindividual ”interpretative grids” that
symbolically structure what we experience emotionally, cognitively,
and morally (Alexander 2003:31). Accordingly the root “culture,” in
relation to the prefix sub, is best understood as an adjective—cultural—
rather than as a noun. The cultural is not a thing or a dependent variable
to be studied or grasped physically or metaphysically, but a contrastive
dimensional thread that runs through all subcultural communication
and interpretation (Appadurai 1998:12f, Alexander 2003:7). This
means not only that subcultural difference is communicated, but that
it refers to the communication of a significant difference, in the sense
that it works to establish and strengthen the mobilization of subcultural
identities and actions.
To merely argue that the subcultural is that which is conceived
and communicated as different from an unspecified “other” would
not be a satisfactory definition, as it would then be only another
empty categorization. Moore (2005:250) notes, for example, that our
contemporary society is obsessed with differentiation from the mass.
Swimmers might, for example, define themselves as different from
walkers and joggers, but this alone does not make them a subculture.
What needs to be added is a patterned similarity in terms of adherence
to a subcultural structure—that in order for a subcultural distinction
to be significant, it requires depth. This is similar to what Hodkinson
(2002:30) refers to as a cultural substance: subcultures are defined by
a shared and distinctive set of tastes and values shared by participants.

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Yet, whereas Hodkinson focuses mainly on substance as pointing to

subcultural objects, identities, commitment, or relative autonomy, I
want to focus on the subcultural structure of meaning within which
objects and identities, as well as commitment and autonomy, are
made subcultural; in short, how subcultural meaning is extended and
materialized. This must include a dialectic approach to subcultural
difference and similarity, investigating how different boundary works
converge into similarly shared patterns of meaning within which
the communicated difference to a mainstream is both meaningful
and reproduced (cf. Geertz 1973:211ff, Lamont 2000). It becomes a
combination of what Arjun Appadurai refers to as the differences that
express and mobilize group identities, and the similarities Clifford
Geertz talks about in terms of extending these through analogies
and metaphors. To Geertz metaphors and analogies work to extend
the boundaries of the cultural system; subcultural actions and objects
are thus performed as having a resonance with, and extending the
binary logic of, the background. Action and objects then become
“an act of recognition, a pairing in which an object (or an event, an
act, an emotion) is identified by placing it against the background
of an appropriate symbol” (Geertz 1973:215). To argue that actions
and objects are subcultural is to say that they are based on, refer to,
and contribute to a collective understanding of the separation from
a defined mainstream. If validated as successful, they then work
to extend the patterned representations of the background as the
performance is fused with it, and thus mobilize subcultural identities
or styles (Alexander 2004). Hence subcultural representations are used
to establish boundaries between real and fake along the subcultural/
mainstream binary as they draw upon an internal meaning that is part
of the boundary work to the outside (Fine 1998:138).
It is through this relation between the prefix sub and the root
cultural that the different definitions of the mainstream within punk
outlined above should be assessed. What these definitions of the
mainstream, as well as their associated scripts, have in common is that
they work to separate the set apart sacred from the undifferentiated
profane, the particular from the general. Where they differ is in how
this distinction is perceived and portrayed: different definitions of the
mainstream bring different articulations of the subcultural sacred, as
well as of the prohibitions meant to protect the latter. By combining

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 Redefining the subcultural: the sub and the cultural

the similar consequences of different enactments of punk in my

more recent work (Hannerz 2015), I point to how punk is structured
through interrelated patterns of meaning. The first of these patterns
combines different definitions of the mainstream as the normal, the
obedient, and the commercial through a consistency in terms of how
the subcultural binary is worked and extended: Regardless of whether
the mainstream is people in general who strive to be like everyone
else, the homogeneous mass that is too afraid to break free from the
restrictions that keeps them in place, or if it concerns institutions that
seek to profit from punk, these definitions identify the boundary to the
mainstream as concerning what is perceived as external to punk. Punk
in this sense is the absence of outside agents, be they passive consumers
or active exploiters. This pattern works to extend the subcultural
scripts that mobilize the exclusion of these mainstreams as well as
set the groundwork for subcultural identification, communication, and
authentication to become a quest for individual rights. To be punk in
this sense is to physically and symbolically take on the mainstream
in order to secure a number of basic individual rights: the right to be
different, the right to be yourself, and the right to do what you want.
Beside the analogous extension of punk to the freed individual, there
is a similar analogy to that of standing out; the subcultural sacred is
established, secured and defended in a direct confrontation with the
mainstream, either on the street, in school, or in media. Indeed, the
most revered bands in relation to this subcultural pattern were those
who had made a career, sold a lot of records, and still refused to sign to
a major label, participate in morning TV shows, or if they had done so,
refused to change or give up their subcultural ideas, style and identities.
I have referred to this pattern as a convex subcultural pattern because
it bends towards the outside (Hannerz 2015: 82-5).
In sharp contrast to this subcultural pattern stands a second subcultural
pattern that instead combines the distinction against a shallow, style-
centered, hedonist and dependent mass of punks: Punks in general
are here perceived to have destroyed what punk should be through
their focus on standing out, having fun, and thinking of, and doing for,
themselves. Calls are made to establish a physical separation from the
mainstream punks through an emphasis on a collective freed space: the
scene. The definite use of the scene is also used to capture a translocal
character of the subcultural sacred (Hodkinson 2002, Moore 2007): it

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refers to all participants in the world who fight to achieve distance from
the mass of punks. Politics are here claimed and authenticated as a vital
tool for ensuring an equal and emancipating space, yet at the same time
they are predominantly used to separate between participants, rather
than liberating them. Freedom, in this sense, is defined as a collective
freedom from, rather than a freedom for. When this pattern is enacted
there are no distinctions or prohibitions aimed at what is deemed
as external to the subcultural. Instead, the scripts through which
participants mobilize and authenticate their subcultural identities rest
on a reactive stance towards punk: Dress, appearance, objects, politics
and actions are authenticated as not dressing, looking, doing, and
thinking like the defined mainstream punks. At the same time as this
draw upon the boundary against an internal mainstream, it establishes
and strengthens the point behind such a boundary work. As long as the
defined non-subcultural remains outside of the subcultural, it has little,
if any, meaning within a concave pattern. Lastly, the internal distinction
of the background and its foreground scripts all have the consequence
of subordinating the individual to the collective: individual consistency
becomes something polluting as a continuous development, and
allegiance to the rules and regulations of the collective are to ensure
the maintenance and protection of the scene. I refer to this as a concave
subcultural pattern as it bends inwards (Hannerz 2015:131-3).
This similar structuring of the subcultural heterogeneities is the
cultural dimension of the subcultural. There were no difference for
example between how punks in Sweden and Indonesia defined,
communicated, and acted upon the mainstream, despite the extensive
socio-economic, geographic, and infrastructural differences between
the two cultures. This cultural dimension extends the meaning of
the prefix sub as it involves what Derrida (1988:18) refers to as the
“citational” and “iterable” quality of speech, success being a matter
of repeating that which is already coded and established. Geertz
(1973:211) makes a similar note in arguing that the success or failure of
symbolic extensions of the known to the as of yet unfamiliar depends on
whether they manage to represent an analogous relation to a patterned
set of meanings that are already ordered. If the analogy appears, the
already known is extended to include the unfamiliar, and if it does
not appear then it has failed (cf. Alexander and Mast 2006). To act
within the subcultural is to enact the subcultural pattern that precedes

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 Redefining the subcultural: the sub and the cultural

or is superimposed on the act. It becomes a performance against these

background representations of meaning (Alexander 2004:529).
Hence, to return to the matter of depth, to argue for a subcultural
structure to be significant is to say that it extends the distinction from an
undifferentiated mainstream to a pattern of articulated differences that
address a variety of styles—including actions, objects, appearances,
and tastes—interpreted and validated through a shared language
(i.e., a patterned set of meanings within which actions and objects
are seen to fit) (Fine 1998:102). The argument that extensions of the
binary are what distinguish the subcultural means that if we are to
speak of male-, class-, or youth-based subcultures it is because these
distinctions are articulated as analogous to the distinction between
the subcultural and the mainstream. As Macdonald (2001:150) notes,
what goes for one subcultural group does not have to be the same
for another, nor, in the light of the discussion above, does it have to
be the same within the same subculture. The deeper the subcultural
structure, the more areas of everyday life are integrated and made to
fit, making it possible to differentiate between shallower or deeper
subcultural structures in terms of salience and extension (Hannerz
1992:72f). Swimmers’ possible distinction from walkers or runners
would thus be significant if that distinction was extended analogically
to, for example, prohibitions regarding dress and action: e.g., not eating
land-living animals, not wearing colors other than shades of blue and
green, not having a wet hair look, etc.. Consequently, rather than Paul
Willis’ (1978:198ff) famous reference to objects being homologous
depending on their objective possibilities, the analogous extensions of
something symbolically representing something else rather points to
such successful extensions appearing as if they had these possibilities
(Trondman et al. 2011:584).

Concluding remarks
Throughout this article I have sought to argue for a refinement of
subcultural theory that moves beyond style to how objects, actions, and
identities are communicated, interpreted, and ultimately acted upon.
The foundation for this subcultural structuring rests on an articulated
difference to the undifferentiated, or what is here referred to as the
mainstream. It is a boundary work that defines the set apart sacred

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ERIK HANNERZ

by its distance from the undifferentiated profane. This distinction is

extended through prohibitions concerning the profane, specifying who
and what can come in contact with the sacred. These prohibitions,
and the sacred characteristics that they specify, are the deep meaning
structure of the subcultural. The articulation of these prohibitions,
and thus also the characteristics that are set apart as belonging to the
sacred, are dependent on the distinction between the subcultural and
the mainstream: What is conceived of as constituting the latter has
consequences for what needs to be protected and from whom.
In relation to this, I have argued that subcultural identities and
authenticities as performances rely on these structures to be claimed,
validated, or refuted. This implies a dialectic process between difference
and similarity, a definition of a shared subcultural sacred through the
prohibitions to the profane mainstream. Hence, both the sacred and the
profane are constructed through these prohibitions. This, I argue, has
consequences for how we can approach how subcultural participants
perceive, interpret, and act upon a defined mainstream, but also
how objects, actions, and identities are authenticated or invalidated.
Further, different interpretations and definitions of these analogies
bring differences in terms of subcultural structures. Different patterns
can be differently symbolically extended, fusing some actions while
dismissing others. When extended through analogies these differences
bring about different subcultural authenticities.
Given Bennett’s claim that the subcultural risks becoming a watered
down catch-all phrase, my aspiration with this article is to prove the
opposite: That the subcultural as a concept has a important place in the
analysis of the ordering of styles, identities and actions. In so doing, it
relies on Williams’s claim that the cultural aspect of the concept needs
to be further stressed. As Matthew Worley (2013:626) argues, whereas
focus has been on the meaning projected onto the subcultural, we must
not forget the meaning drawn from it. The refinement presented here
does not deviate much from previous subcultural theory; instead, by
focusing on the prefix sub and its relation to the root cultural, I have
shown how the concept can be developed so as to explain differences
between subcultures in terms of these structures of interrelated
meanings: Participants extend the subcultural binary through
analogous binary correspondences that mobilize action, objects, and

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 Redefining the subcultural: the sub and the cultural

identities as subcultural. At the same time, this approach provides for

an analysis of plurality within the subcultural in relation to multiple
structures of meaning, allowing for a discussion of how the subcultural
is symbolically extended and how this process is far from given as
it involves both conflict and alternative interpretations. From such a
point of view there are no subcultural objects, only meanings; thus, the
same object can have a number of possible meanings even within the
same subcultural structure. Consequently, such an approach is, unlike
previous subcultural theories, able to address and assess subcultural
heterogeneities without having to champion the individual, fluidity of
style, or one group’s commitment and authenticity.

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