ABSTRACT
Traditional sociology defined working-class adolescents’ leisure as a problem, like other deviations from consensual norms, and explanations of social-class differences among young people at leisure were linked to prevailing theories of crime and deviance. Working-class youth often express defiance and opposition in contra-cultures, but middle-class youth are the more likely to nurture values and skills which assist individual and collective solutions to class problems. Condoning the constraints with which they contend becomes a real danger when ‘appreciating’ working-class youth’s leisure. Sociologists also agree that youth cultures are class divided. Classless youth is a popular, but patently absurd fiction. Laymen who believe youth cultures to be classless are very distant observers. The majority of working-class youth profess disinterest in politics. Students fraternise mainly with other students. Even those on city-centre campuses rarely integrate with downtown youth. Leisure industries may attempt to define, then aim goods and services at a general youth market.
