GENERATIONS IN AMATEUR ARTS ??

Andries van den Broek

Active Cultural Participation in Europe

Ghent, June 8-10, 2011

GENERATIONS

in families transfer / socialization

in society similarities / differences

GENERATIONS in families

transfer of capital

economic

social

cultural

genetic

GENERATIONS in families

as the old sing, so .... ???

factor 2chances of involvement in active cultural participation are about twice as high if parents are involved

GENERATIONS in society

CREATIVE DESTRUCTION (Schumpeter)

a process of ongoing innovation, in which successful new techniques destroy (replace) the old

GENERATIONS in society

AUGUSTE COMTE (a century before!):

social progress essentially depends on death

generation replacement / social metabolism

GENERATIONS in society

KARL MANNHEIM: ‘formative period’ in youth, in which people acquire a world view that influences them the rest of their life

people grow up in different times

people acquire different world views

cohorts/generations differ from each other

GENERATIONS in society

deceptive charm

attractive categorization

face value recognition

but often little empirical justification

GENERATIONS in society

the three faces of time (three influences on who I am)

age: how old am I ??

cohort: when did I grow up ??

period: what year do I live in now ??

GENERATIONS in society

every generation ages, moves through life course

every generation lives through historical time

do generations still have specific characteristics ??

any how: “50+ generation” is a contradiction in terms

GENERATIONS in society

amateur arts and age:

lifecycle: decrease 40-65 and 65+

amateur arts and cohort:

post-war more active than pre-warpost-war less organized than pre-war

GENERATIONS in society

in conclusion: concept of generations

attractive

deceptive

only partially empirical reality