Thea 'tricks': forms of resistance in the 1968 United States and after

Abstract

The year 1968 seems to be the climax of the counterculture, as manifold forms of resistance emerged and multiple claims were asserted by various social groups. Such a polyphony may appear as a hodgepodge of uncoordinated elements, all the more so as 1968 seems to be the year of rifts and dissensions between “movement cultures,” radical politicized groups, and the more hedonistic and apolitical hippies. In order to show that 1968 is both a puzzle and a puzzling year which prepared the ground for late twentieth-century cultures of resistance, the subsequent analysis will revolve around the politics of immediacy—involving humor, theatricality, as well as an experimental and interpersonal bias. This politics of immediacy is illustrated by a few 1968 events, among them the Democratic National Convention riots in Chicago and the Miss America Pageant protest in Atlantic City. At the same time, the article emphasizes the costumes and performances of a few actors of the revolution so as to show how the fusing of “dressing down” and “rising up” ended up influencing later youth subcultures as well as the performances, sartorial stances, and flaunted aggressiveness of other cultures of resistance, among them “third-wave” feminist groups and artists.