ABSTRACT
We want to begin this chapter by highlighting that, as far as we know, this is the first content area methods text to include a chapter on youth culture in the history of the field. We are happy to have a role in this historic moment, a moment of realizing that young people not only have experiences, interests, and needs that stem from their family and community lives outside of school, but that they also have experiences, interests, and needs that grow out of their interactions with peers as they use and produce cultural texts of their own. In what follows, we refer to these sets of experiences as “youth cultures,” as a way of recognizing that youth cultures are not monolithic or unidimensional. Youth cultures vary by geography, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, and other important qualities of difference. In addition, one young person may belong to or draw from many different youth cultures, and youth cultures intersect with family, community, and popular cultures in important and diverse ways.
