Rebecca C. Raby: A Tangle of Discourses: Girls Negotiating Adolescence (Reflection)

This article by Rebecca C. Raby really provoked a lot of repressed memories of my own teenage experiences. Although I was a teenager a mere 4 years ago, the experiences and changes I went through are still vivid. I really enjoyed this article even though it was somewhat dense and seemingly difficult to decipher. Raby breaks down the adolescent experience into five categories: the storm, becoming, at-risk, social problem, and pleasure consumption. For each of these categories, I've chosen to draw on a specific teenage experience that I've had and relate it to the text. Here it goes...



1.) The storm: Raby refers to the storm as the turbulent, risk-taking and experimental angst of teens. I feel as though teenagers sometimes feel angsty because of the constant want to resist parental and authoritative control because they're "not kids anymore". When I was about 15, I used to sneak out of my house to go down to the skate park and smoke pot with the older kids. I lied about my age so that the 19-20 year olds would think I was cool enough to hang out with them. These behaviors were risk-taking because I would walk 1 mile in the dark by myself with no cell phone, actively trying to avoid repercussions from my strict father. I look back on this and think it was absolutely ridiculous that I did these rebellious things, but at the time I thought it was a way to resist control and be an adult. Because that's what all the adults do.

 ^ This is where I did all my teenage pot smoking. All the older skateboard guys hung out there. Those are hard to find in Milford, NH.

2.) Becoming: Raby refers to becoming as a way of finding one's identity and a process of self-discovery. I went through many different phases in high school. My never-ending evolution of facial piercings, tattoos and morphing hair colors has never ceased to exist, but as a teenager it was in full force. I went from preppy to  "scene-queen" to crust punk, to punk hippie to classy alternative and back to crust punk and so forth. I never seemed to care what anybody thought of my style or hair colors, I just bought what I liked and everybody would have to accept it. I always thought of myself as "different" and god knows I got made fun of by the popular kids, but I looked awesome. Self-discovery.

 ^ I had this haircut for a while

3.) At-Risk: Raby refers to at-risk as the inevitable factors that teens are vulnerable to that lead to experimentation with "drugs and alcohol, depression, eating disorders and sexually transmitted diseases." This seems like the category in which I can mostly relate to in my teenage years. I was an avid show-goer. I was one of the first of my friends to get my license and we would drive hours to go see punk shows in Boston after telling our parents we're going to the mall. We stole beer from people, snuck outside to smoke pot and spent our time meeting up with boys from Myspace at shows who we had never met before in person. These are extremely risk-taking behaviors, but we were merely experimenting with things we had never done in our younger years.

Secret party at the sweatshop warehouse tonight!!!!! YEAH!

4.) Social Problem: Raby refers to social problem as society and guardians viewing teens and teens problems as a burden. As a young punk rocker, I got all sorts of shit from adults. My teachers thought I was suicidal and/or a drug addict and would send me to the guidance counselor for assessments every few weeks. My father wanted to send me to boarding school. The cops were always trying to set me straight by arresting me for no reason. (They definitely had their reasons, though). It seems that a lot of adults see teenagers as inconveniences and treat them as so.

I Googled "teenagers are annoying" and this is what came up.

5.) Pleasure Consumption: Raby refers to pleasure consumption as the strong force of the media pushing teenagers to buy certain clothes, look a certain way and stay very close to the "social norm". To put it simply, teenagers want what's advertised to them in magazines, commercials and through other forms of media like television shows. I remember looking around my classroom and seeing a vast sea of Ugg boots and North Face fleeces. And Victoria Secret pants. Ugh. I used to call my classmates "cookie-cutter people" because it seemed that whenever a new product came out, they all flocked like sheep to Abercrombie to buy it. I thought of myself as "cooler" than them and I did most of my shopping from online independent t-shirt companies. I also made all of my own clothes (I had a SICK sewing machine.)

OMG they all look the same and they look SO happy! Look at the alternative one on the right.. she doesn't look THAT alternative and look how happy she is!!!

In the next class I'd like to discuss what everybody elses experiences were with Raby's five categories of teenage life. Everybody comes from different backgrounds and no two teenage experiences are the same so I'd really like to hear how everybody else relates to this article.

Watch this My Chemical Romance music video for their song "Teenagers". Look at all the stereotypes!!