Cruising for Community: Youth Culture and Politics in Los Angeles, 1910-1970.

Abstract

“Cruising for Community” examines youth culture in Los Angeles from the Progressive era of the early 1900s to the civil rights, antiwar, and counterculture movements of the 1960s. During this period, youth culture developed as a product of the triangular relationship of the state, the market, and youth subcultures. From early hot rodders to post-industrial punks, youth subcultures provided young people a means to develop local music, dancing, sports, and fashion. Through subcultures, young Angelinos like Jewish socialists and Chicano activists struggled to create a more just and multicultural city. L.A.’s suburban sprawl and corresponding social structures coordinated subcultures, and youth culture was expressed spatially. Cruising—parading without permit—represents young Angelinos’ appropriation of the street to forge belonging, friendship and new identities.

Whereas many historians have claimed that generations are essential to historical change, this dissertation identifies instances of collaboration as well as resistance across age groups. Local middlemen saw the profitability of youth subcultures and through co-optation placed locally generated products on the national market. Concurrently, adult youth experts lobbied to manage youth culture as a way to ensure social stability and common civic identity. This sometimes resulted in draconian policies such as the closing of cruising strips; at other points, youth experts encouraged collaboration, leading to organizations like adult-sponsored car clubs. The mobilizing power of youth culture was recognized by progressive youth leaders, who supported groups of young Angelinos in challenging the social inequities found within their communities; political demonstrations and school walkouts appropriated the city’s structures to critique inequity, creating the means for a shared political identity.

While cruising represented a balance between the market, the state, and young people, other alignments alienated youth—often along class, race, ethnic, and gender lines—and denied them autonomy with dramatic consequences, such as the Zoot Suit Riot and Watts Uprising. “Cruising for Community” gives an analysis of local youth culture that accounts for its evolution, attendant subcultures, and role in 20th century American history. As such, the dissertation connects cultural studies of youth with American urban history, critically contributing to investigations of modern youth, youth culture, and politics.