WHAT IS CONTEMPORARY CULTURE? - CULTURE VOCABULARY - 2025

The contemporary culture is the set of daily events, thoughts, ideals and customs shared by a group of individuals. Social networks, the internet, new lifestyles, ways of dressing, new ways of thinking, etc., are part of contemporary culture.

This is transmitted through communication, which at the same time forms a society in which these manifestations expand, as well as become traditions, activities and purposes that are preserved from generation to generation.

These customs, relayed to other generations, give rise to a mixture between their own and typical manifestations of the time, forming contemporary culture.

This is nothing more than the context in which a society develops today, applying new guidelines and lifestyles, through previously acquired knowledge.

These guidelines and lifestyles are known as cultural currents and social stereotypes, which vary according to the influences of the group of people that make them up.

Contemporary culture and its influences

From the very first era of the human being, the combination and sum of individual customs ended up becoming influences that later with the growth of humanity also expanded, as indicated through communication.

As man and his lifestyle evolved, in the same way, their mechanisms of interaction developed, until they became means of communication. The main influence for the manifestation and expansion of mass culture.

The mass media generate an extraordinary diffusion around the world about the cultural currents and social stereotypes that establish a certain concrete culture.

Each individual ends up adopting it despite the fact that it comes from a tiny environment, but achieving the goal of expanding it through fundamental platforms such as television, cinema or radio.

At present, it should be noted that the Internet is part of these cultural influences, since more and more people have access to it, either to consume information or communicate through web pages or even the phenomenon of networks social.

Internet as part of culture

What previously served as a purely means of communication has been established as a model of lifestyles for the masses.

Precisely, through social networks, people can be influenced by others, no matter how far they are or have a very different daily life, what is called the Anglo-Saxon way of life.

These are adopted without prejudice by groups through the exchange of music, art, literature and fashion in all its maximum expression, called countercultural currents and that make culture a unique model to follow around the world, giving way to globalization..

The Internet has become the preferred and most widely used mechanism for transmitting culture in the wider humanity, because it not only goes further, but it is also faster.

This allows such manifestations to be quickly renewed to the replacement generations, which are part of popular culture, they are even called with pseudonyms such as Baby Boom, Generation X, Generation Y or Millennials and Generation Z.

Globalization

To speak of cultural manifestation and its expansion is to speak of globalization, the basis of which is contemporary culture. It is said that through the Internet, social and community groups and institutions have been formed that await links to continue with cultural transformations.

This was done since the beginning of humanity, only now with more awareness and in order to preserve it.

This is also part of processes that include ICTs (Information and Communication Technologies), which are mechanisms that intervene in cultural transformations through communication and interactivity in global networks, whether governmental, educational or family.

The objective of globalization is to open up new ways to understand social life and new guidelines related to humanism.

Baby boom

The so-called Baby Boom generation is the most popular of the last four cultural currents with which humanity is divided in terms of lifestyles, fashion, custom and way of globalizing.

They are people born between 1945 and 1964 after World War II. They were named for the high birth rate that was recorded at that time.

By then, the priorities were work, productivity, economic and financial status, while leisure was not part of their customs.

In fact, popular culture was based on the establishment of the traditional model of the family.

Also, at this time an important milestone was marked in society and it was the inclusion of women in the labor field, beginning with the recognition of their rights or gender equality.

Generation X

The next generation of popular culture is X, made up of people born between 1965 and 1981, already directly influenced by the Internet as part of their daily lives. They were the ones who in their youth appreciated the change of analog life with the digital age.

However, organizational culture remained part of this generation, in which work continued to be an essential part of society, despite perfectly adapting to the rules established by technology and mass connectivity. In other words, leisure continued to take a back seat.

What is certain is that the rise of popular culture began to be more noticeable in terms of music, fashion and style, allowing a greater connection with the next social group that emerged from the new millennium, in the year 2000.

Generation Y or Millennials

This generation is more contemporary, made up of those born between 1982 and 1994, known as Millennials because they are masses who do not conceive the world without technology. Their priority is quality of life and entertainment.

Its culture is based on communication through the Internet, messages, social networks, as well as music, through CD players, MP3, MP4, DVD or totally digital formats.

They are the ones who have allowed the growth of globalization through digital media.

Generation Z

It is the set of individuals who were born from 1995 to the present. They have greater influence from Generation Y or Millennials and their contemporaneity is exclusively the digital age, since they are natives of it. That is, they are called “digital natives”.

But it is also true that they are not yet adults, they are not part of the world of work and finance, but they have been generators of consumerism.

Cell phones, tablets and the Internet are part of their daily lives, since technology is essential in their day to day.

The means of communication that they use the most are social networks, deepening virtual environments, which is through these that they lead to globalization, generating new directions of humanism and society.

Themes of interest

What Are the Cultural Elements and Which are the Most Important?

References

1. Lewis. Contemporary Culture, Cultural Studies and the Global Mediasphere. (2007). Recovered from: uk.sagepub.com.
2. Stanley Knick. Traditional Culture and Modern Culture. (2010). Source: huffingtonpost.com.
3. Contemporary culture. Source: e-ducativa.catedu.es.
4. Contemporaryculture: contemporaryculture.org.
5. Peri Bradley. Food, Media and Contemporary Culture. (2016): springer.com.