The Theories: Goth Subculture

The goth subculture has associated tastes in music, aesthetics and fashion. Goth is a very loose term and since its creation in the 1970's goths have involved into different types. 23 different types. The most common ones to branch from this sub-culture most recently is the Emo, Cyber and Steampunk .

[Click here to access the website on the different types]

Music Types:
Gothic rock, death rock, post-punk, dark wave, dark ambient, ethereal wave, industrial music and neoclassical dark wave, with contemporary links to the heavy metal subculture.

Fashion:
Style range from death rock, punk and Victorian styles, combinations of them also, most often with dark attire, make-up and hair

The Effects Model:
The effects model focuses on how the media can affect society and how society can effect the media. The theory also helps to explain moral panic in relation to sex, drugs, violence etc.

The article shown to the right does just that. It talks about how those who chose to be part of that subculture are being targeted and it is being labelled as a hate crime, not as the causes of the violence. Hate crime is a very strong label for the violence which occurred. Hate crime now also includes by subculture. The most recent story was in August of 2013, where 38 year old Goth, Alexys Becerra was attacked. News reports like these would cause a moral panic for parents who children dress this way or indeed Goths who feel concerned for their safety. Instead of them creating the violence and hurting other people, it is reversed, where they get the abuse from others for expressing themselves differently.

Definition: a crime motivated by racial, sexual, or other prejudice, typically one involving violence.

Two-step Flow model:

The two-step flow model is when individuals look to opinion leaders to interpret the media for them and then from this they get their own opinion. When applying the Goth subculture to the model, the opinion leaders are most likely to be band artists of one of the music styles. For example, Black Veil Brides, My Chemical Romance, Evanescence, Marilyn Manson etc. Since the subculture is heavily influenced by clothing and music their opinion leaders are to be people of that industry, their idols who they want to be like as well being an individual. The most popular person in the group gets followed by the others in the group and they look to them in opinions to then expand on.

Each subculture in different groups in different places in the country will have some sort of leader, but it's not usually the case. They are usually part of a community; Goths don't really have a leader.

Uses and Gradifications Model:

This is when youth culture has used media for their own enjoyment, to fulfill a specfic need or/and to communicate with others.

Since the boost in technological advances social networking sight have become more common. The Goth subculture hasn't really been using the media to its advantage as their aren't any major stories in the news, but the two mentioned above. Out of all the subcultures Goths are fairly quiet. There are of course specific forums for the subculture to talk with others with the same interest and there are videos on YouTube.com, which from watching at aren't as arrogant as would be expected from a youth culture. From my searching on YouTube, I think the Goth Subculture is a very quiet one and is mainly recognised by their presentation.

One example is this video, which touches on the concerns for parents made by a member of the goth subculture. If anything this is a mature thing to do and show them as a polite, friendly, helpful group of individuals, unlike others they don't publicise any negative actions or thoughts. If anything they are understanding and try to clarify what a Goth actually is.   

Youth subcultures use media to express themselves and share content with others of the same culture. It has become easy to communicate with others and that is what all young people do, no matter what culture you are a part of. It is the 'norm' for young people to use all sorts of media, predominantly online.