Hello friends,

Today has been a slightly calmer day of settling in at ETSU (East Tennessee State University).  One of the reasons it was slightly calmer is that a good bit of the day involved waiting in lines.  And waiting.  And wai- well, I’m sure you get the picture.  That’s not to say it was all negative.  Several knew friends became known during this time and (nearly) all of the annoying bureaucratic nonsense was completed, which means now that the move and the organization has been mostly completed, I can focus primarily on my study of storytelling.  As a celebration of this new focus, I played X-box and PlayStation video games with my house-mate, Raynor (hehe, don’t worry, I recognize the inconsistency in that statement).

But have no frets, I also did work on some storytelling research and read information about the ‘beat generation’ and some Allen Ginsberg.  This caused me to ponder, as well written works often do, and I found myself wondering is there a contemporary counterculture in America.  I recognize there are many subcultures in America (the retro ‘hippies’ of the jam music scene, inner city rap fans, the theater community,…), but it seems each of these subcultures conforms with societal standards to such a great extent that they cannot be termed ‘counterculture’.

This may be from Western Society opening its acceptability standards to such a great extent that what would have in the past been termed an unacceptable counterculture is now acceptable, or it may be because we as a group do not feel safe rebelling as a culture, or it may be because the media has dulled our ambition to such an extent to that the motivation cannot be found for any group of peoples to fight against the constraints imposed by society, or it may be for any one of a billion other reasons, or it may be that there is a or several counter cultures.  I don’t claim to know, these are just some thoughts.

What I have noticed, however, is that I have felt what seems to be a dissatisfaction with the order of things by many people, an undercurrent of searching for something, but what that something is we are not sure.  Unfortunately I can’t better articulate this idea.  I’ve had conversations with several friends about this, and they have agreed that there is… maybe a social unrest? of some sort beginning to look for a way to reveal itself in American society; not with every person, but everyday it seems more are becoming aware of it.

I don’t know if there is any validity to this idea or if its just me blowing hot air out of my youthful, revolution oriented skull, but I would be curious on all of your thoughts.  Please, if you could, give me any thoughts you might have on the idea of a true counterculture in America today and the possibility of a typically unacknowledged search for… something.

I hope all is well with you and all the best stories are finding you, and until we talk again,

Best,

Lethan

This entry was posted on Friday, August 24th, 2007 at 8:22 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.