Forever Young: the “teen-aging” of modern culture
By Marcel Danesi
University of Toronto Press (distributed by Plymbridge) pound;14

With the exception of fleeting references to high school proms and the failure of sex education to encourage safe sex among teens, Marcel Danesi doesn’t touch on education until the final 10 pages of Forever Young. When he does, his view of schooling is alarming and, given the insightful argument he makes about the evanescent nature of teens and teen culture, incoherent.

His argument that popular culture is imbued with a “juvenile aesthetic” is interesting and informative. His semiotics background comes in handy when contrasting today’s view of the angst-ridden adolescent with his medieval counterpart; then, adolescens referred to pre-pubescent boys who moved away from their families to work in a guild or trade. Danesi finds that today’s adults are desperate to avoid growing up.

Read more in this week’s TES Friday magazine