American Punks as an American Mosaic
Daniel Hoffman | United States
Photographer: Daniel Hoffman
Exhibit Title: American Punks as an American Mosaic
Location: United States
The idea of “America” has evolved and changed since 1959. While America is less homogeneous now than ever before, it is no less fraught with social challenges to understand what it means to be “American.” However, sitting on the margins of our society is a group of Americans who form a community that celebrates ideals central to being “American,” the American Punks.
In their music and dance, punks celebrate life, mutual trust and support, and freedom to express themselves about social injustice and the government. Indeed, American Punks form a dynamic example of the “American Mosaic.” American Punks come from all sectors of society and often include immigrants, all are welcome provided you are free of bias and judgement.E Pluribus Unum.
This project explores the idea of American Punks as a social movement that embodies what it means to be American.
Punks: An Authentic American Mosaic
You look across the room and survey the crowd, searching for something consistently identifiable in the crowd, aside from a sea of black clothing. You see spiked hair, countless piercings, and maybe a few horn implants. You see dozens of not-your-dad’s tattoos.You see five friends who grab one another’s hands and begin to spin until they lose control and fly into the crowd with a force that you’d think could knock several adults down. What you’re really seeing, at least in terms of ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, age, heritage, education, income, and even immigrant status, is a truly iconic American mosaic. It is America’s Punks as a community in many ways representative of the contemporary ideal of American society: highly individualistic and yet highly inclusive.
For most people, thoughts and images of punk rock seem stuck in the badly dated stereotypes of the 1970s. Picture groups of white guys in skinny jeans and spiked mohawks slamming into each other until bloody. Recall The Ramones and Sid Vicious. Yet, these stereotypes—largely the product of misgivings, anxieties, and downright fears—prevent most people from recognizing, accepting, and maybe even celebrating a community that exemplifies what it means to be American. “American,” that is, if the idea of America as a great mosaic of humanity—many pieces, one whole—is not just a convenient and comforting myth but rather a living (if sometimes messy) reality. E Pluribus Unum:“out of many, one.”
One way to understand how punks form an American mosaic if to think of them as a small village. If this village were what we imagine and hope would show the best of America, it would be a community that is diverse and inclusive: never excluding or marginalizing, only welcoming and being home to everyone.The punk “village” creates this kind of community with an apparent ease that people fail to see if they get distracted by the clothing and endless antics in the mosh pit or the pounding, frantic music. Resist the temptation of negative stereotypes and, instead, discover the diversity and openness inherent in the interactions of the bands and the fans, men, women, trans, gay, young, old, tats or no tats, citizens and immigrants alike, black, white, Asian, Latino, etc., etc. Once you have the door opened to the punk world, you will find chefs from expensive restaurants, garbage collectors, engineers, writers, tattoo artists, teachers, parents, and children with their parents.They may be from the same city, but many are far farther afield, and some are from other countries, all bringing their own history to punk.
Yes, there is a hint, sometimes more than a hint, of “anti-establishment,” but this is balanced by a live-and-let live spirit. This attitude is most palpable in the mosh pit. When asked what draws them to the pit, almost everyone describes an exhilarating feeling of freedom within a community where they feel accepted and free. As one African American punk said, “When I was younger I went to church, now I go to shows.The mosh pit is almost a religious experience for me.” Yes, people fly off the stage, spin with their arms until they hit something or someone, kick backwards without looking, jump into or onto the crowd. A lot goes on and seeing how people move and react and respond is a display of mutual trust, tempers only rarely flair and disagreements are settled as a group, and quickly.In a sense, the community is based on the idea that people are there by choice and they elect to stay by choice, provided their behavior is aligned with the scene.A singer in one band spoke about his path from addiction to sobriety said, “It’s an expression of my existence.That is why I got clean; how can we fight against injustice if we are being unjust to ourselves?” Punks are drawn to this form of personal expression for several reasons, some migrated from skate culture, others came to it through graffiti, yet you also have former gang members, students, and professionals, such as the librarian, actor, labor organizer, and geologist.
A mosaic is defined as an image made of irregular pieces.There may be no better definition of the American mosaic than American Punks.
Daniel Hoffman is a professor and photographer. Over the past 30 years he had made eight photodocumentaries in many different countries including the US, Japan, Kenya, Brazil, and Bulgaria.
Daniel J. Hoffman
djhoffman@outlook.com
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