Project Proposal

Each generation has subcultures which go against or transform the ideology of the mainstream values and practices of the generation before them creating a tension between the two on a personal level as well as broader, social level. The subculture of the beats of the 1950s is a strong portrayal of this generational divide. The artistic and literary creations of the beats were intended to transform mainstream society’s views on sex, consumerism, ecological awareness, and spiritual life. However, many from the generation before misread or feared and undervalued the transformational goals of the beats. Economic changes and disillusionment were large factors in opening the space for societal transformation, and yet, this cycle of generational divide seems to persist time and time again—is there ever a time when parent’s read their children correctly?

This generational misread forced the beats to use various methods and terms to represent their movement and values. A constellation of images created by the bums” and “Zen lunatics”, illustrate the extensive explication of who they were as a transformational, artistic movement. Often read as lazy bums, ne’er-do-wells, “mom- (and cop-) haters”, the beats holistic aims and spiritually expansive goals, were undervalued in their time, and yet, currently, more and more people are jumping on the bandwagon of their various ideals and admiring the work which they so ardently produced a half a century ago.

Both Ginsberg and Kerouac had interesting relations with their relatives and the traditionalist literary artists before them. In analyzing their relations and feelings towards both these aspects of generational divide, I plan to explore this divide and the effects produced on the beats themselves and the transformational work that they created. Also, in order to analyze the divide between the subculture of the beats and mainstream culture of the older society, I plan to utilize the Life Magazine article which Nancy J. Peters references in her essay on the Beat Generation and similarly pop-culture representations of those times.