Graffiti Representations of Subcultural Identity: A photo-essay of Spanish Urban Street Art in Youth Subcultures in Fiction, Film and Other Media

Bentley, N

Abstract

Graffiti has a long history. Writing on walls was practised by our distant ancestors as they represented themselves and the animals they shared their environment and lives with through cave paintings. On ancient Greek and Roman buildings, on Meso-American temples, signs, symbols and messages from the past are found scratched and drawn on walls. Explorers as diverse as Viking marauders and colonists and Victorian grand tourists have left their marks on walls to signify ‘I was here’ (see Lovata and Olton 2015). Abel and Buckley (1973) demonstrated that the fascination that exists for writing messages and leaving names on the private space of public toilets, ‘Latrinalia’, is a common imperative for many. In this way we can perhaps view graffiti as exhibiting a universal human tendency to ‘leave signs of our passing’, to make marks of existence and symbols of our being and presence in the places that we inhabit and occupy, even if only for a limited time.

Citation

Bentley, N., & Zieleniec, A. (2018). Graffiti Representations of Subcultural Identity: A photo-essay of Spanish Urban Street Art in Youth Subcultures in Fiction, Film and Other Media. In N. Bentley, B. Johnson, & A. Zieleniec (Eds.), Youth Subcultures in Fiction, Film and Other Media (197--217). Palgrave. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-73189-6_12

• Online Publication Date: Apr 1, 2018
• Publication Date: Apr 1, 2018
• Publicly Available Date: May 26, 2023
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Pages: 197--217
• Series Title: Palgrave Studies in the History of Subcultures and Popular Music
• Book Title: Youth Subcultures in Fiction, Film and Other Media
• ISBN: 978-3-319-73188-9
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-73189-6_12
• Keywords: subcultures, Spain, graffiti
• Public URL: https://keele-repository.worktribe.com/output/408447
• Publisher URL: https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-73189-6_12