Fille-goth (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Black garb. Victorian dresses. Hanging out at graveyards. A love of the macabre. Enjoyment of music in minor key. All these characteristics are, at least on the surface level, signs that someone is a “Goth.” Goth culture represents one of the fascinating aspects of the contemporary world0–the number of subcultures distinguished by dress, lifestyles, and special interests. This is in part a search for identity, but it also reflects the natural human desire to have friends with common interests (as Aristotle recognized over two thousand years ago).
Goth culture dates back at least thirty years. Musical groups such as Bauhaus performed songs that had to do with the gothic tradition in literature–they focused, for example, on Edgar Allen Poe‘s work or on Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein novel. Young people interested in gothic horror and fascinated by graveyards and death flocked together. They began to wear black and many Goths wore makeup to exaggerate a pale appearance.
Goths do not share any particular world view–some are anti-Christian, some are Buddhists, some are traditional Christian or Jewish. I once chatted with a Muslim Goth. Gothic culture is a way for people who are “different” in their particular interests to find a sense of belonging. Being “different” myself, I can understand that desire. Some of my students think I am a Goth who does not dress like one–I love horror stories, horror music, horror movies, hanging out at graveyards, and being out in the dark “hunting” for ghosts. My office at school is filled with animal skulls–goats (one painted red), a cat, and a monkey. I have a “Grim Reaper” clock and several small manufactured human skulls. The picture of the Mona Lisa hanging on my bulletin board shifts into a skeleton as someone passes by it. I also have a framed copy of a Victorian death photo in which a dead boy, propped up, has his arm around his sister. Now all of this may be a sure sign of my immaturity (I wholeheartedly agree). Most local Goths, though, are very anti-Christian so joining their group is not really an option for me, an orthodox Anglican Catholic.
Emo is said to have replaced Goth, but I do not believe that is the case. There are fewer Goth clubs, but the breadth of Gothic culture as compared to Emo should keep Goth alive for many years. Goth culture, ironically, is often more life-affirming than the angst (usually the teen angst) of Emo. For that reason, Goth culture is not dead or dying–it is alive and well and needs no funeral. Plus, women with jet black hair and wearing black are….aesthetically pleasing.
There is a great deal of ignorance about Goth culture. Some Fundamentalist Christians identify it with Satanism. That is sheer ignorance and does not reflect the past–it is the kind of stupidity that led the West Memphis Three to spend years of their lives in prison despite their innocence of the murder of three cub scouts. Some people fear difference and find it to be evil. That is sad, but it is human nature. Hopefully the Fundamentalists will grow out of their ignorance and realize that Goths are people like them who enjoy each other’s company and are trying to get by in life the best they can. Hopefully this short essay provides a more balanced position on gothic culture.
Related articles
- The Goth Phase: An Exploration In Persona (thoughtcatalog.com)
- Edward Gorey: writer, artist, and a most puzzling man (+video) (csmonitor.com)
Gratiaetnatura's Blog 
Mar 08, 2013 @ 22:25:22
Michael, I wonder what you think the role music/musicians have played, and continue to play, in the creation of the Goth Culture (and other subcultures) as well as their ability to prosper. In the “old” days – read pre-Internet – music provided a way to gather and meet others with the same proclivities, as it still does. Without music as a focal point, would Goths, hipsters, the beat generation, and others, have been less cultures than a bunch of random individuals, living their unique solitary lives? Not sure I’m pleased with how I phrased the question, nevertheless, here it is. If the premise is simply too ignorant – or obvious – feel free to ignore!
Mar 08, 2013 @ 23:14:31
Karen, I think you’re right on the money–in the world of the Internet, there is a kind of “connection,” but it lies outside the real, concrete relations between people in the everyday world. In the Western world, subcultures formed, in part, due to the decline of “natural communities” after the Enlightenment. Such communities continued in parts of the American South and Midwest, as well as in other small towns and rural areas. Following Wendell Berry, I think that world was a better world. In the absence of natural communities formed by family and historical bonds, people only have communities based on common interests. From my understanding, music fueled the Goth movement from the beginning–and there were more Goth clubs and places where people actually met person to person. Today there are rare meetings on special occassions (some of which involve subcultures of Goth with which I would not be comfortable!), but the bulk of “friendships” between Goths are online. As someone with Asperger’s Syndrome (now called “High Functioning Autism Spectrum Disorder” by the psychiatrists), I like solitude, but I am also grateful for the days when there was real human community. It is strange that “greater interconnectedness” occurs in a world of “greater isolation.” Thank you for your question and comment!
Mar 09, 2013 @ 19:12:00
Michael,
Thanks for the thoughtful response, and even better, the introduction to Wendell Berry. The plight of the small farmer and small towns has long been an interest and worry of mine. As an economics grad student, my major area was environmental economics, and I really wanted to find a dissertation topic that would connect the loss of small farms to, well, anything I could find that would have been amenable to my committee. In hindsight, or maybe simply because I know and understand more now, I have a number of ideas. If I had been in ag econ, or known of Berry’s work, I think my attempts would have been successful. I also echo your preference for solitude but would like to live somewhere where there is, as you say, “real human community”. It can be found, to an extent in academia, (and I know that many find it in their churches) with the caveat that it is by nature, an increasingly transient environment. During my time at various institutions, I made a lot of strong and lasting bonds, but the people with whom I formed the connections are scattered all over the world. In that sense, the Internet does help to maintain those connections, especially with the advent of real-time communication via Skype and Instant Messaging. Earlier this week, I spent the hours between midnight and 5 or 6 a.m. on Skype, helping one of my old students (who is living in Nepal) with his graduate school application. In the interest of full disclosure, I taught at Methodist from 2006- 2010 (though I don’t believe we ever met). In October 2010,I fell, breaking my right wrist severely enough to require four surgeries, and providing all the solitude that’s fit to sleep (with apologies to The New York Times). As I begin to get my life together again, I hope I can find the Snarkishly (as in “The Hunting of the Snark” by Charles Dodgson) elusive sense of belonging without it becoming a “boojum.”
Mar 27, 2013 @ 23:29:37
Karen, I do remember you–we had a meeting in an office where, oh, his names escapes me but I always call him in my mind Kermit the Frog since he looks and has the same mannerisms as Kermit. Was it a Stone Lyceum Committee meeting? If I’m right, you’re from PA. Good thoughts on the post, although academia is only a partial community to me given that I am ideologically so different than most academics. Church is more of a community to me since there are more like-minded people to me there (traditionalist, conservative). I do enjoy the intellectual conversation I can have with some academics–I wish I had talked with you more at MU–usually I did not have conversations as deep with the folks in the Business School. I’m sorry about your wrist, but am glad things are starting to work out again for you. God bless.
Mar 17, 2013 @ 17:46:37
Why We CAN’T All Get Along | Dario Ciriello
Mar 27, 2013 @ 13:35:21
Jul 11, 2014 @ 15:39:38
Jun 21, 2016 @ 13:37:32
Over the years I have noticed that in Police mugshot books and in News reports no criminal ever caught has a Goth appearance. In most cases those who are caught are dressed in a utilitarian manner and are very scruffy, just like a late Victorian street urchin.
Jun 21, 2016 @ 13:51:58
I haven’t noticed anyone Goth in a mugshot, either. I find Goth culture fascinating, but I’ve always loved horror novels and movies as well as gothic horror.
May 22, 2019 @ 20:47:40
Have you read Dave McGowan’s Weird Scenes inside The Canyon? Or Daniel Esalon’s book on Tavistock?