Subculture
Definition
A group within a larger society that shares a distinctive set of values, norms, symbols, and practices. In criminology, the term usually refers to groups whose shared norms endorse or facilitate behaviour that the wider legal system defines as criminal or deviant.
Related terms
- Code of the street
- Elijah Anderson's term for an informal set of rules governing public behaviour in disadvantaged urban areas. The code centres on the display...
- Differential opportunity
- Cloward and Ohlin's extension of Merton's strain theory: the type of criminal adaptation that people choose depends not only on blocked legitimate...
- Honour culture
- A cultural context in which personal reputation for toughness or willingness to defend oneself against insults is essential to social standing. Researchers...
- Reaction formation
- A concept Cohen borrowed from psychology to describe the process by which delinquent subcultures do not merely abandon middle-class values but actively...
- Status frustration
- Cohen's term for the psychological tension experienced by working-class boys who are measured against middle-class standards in school and find themselves repeatedly...
Explained in
- Subcultural Theories of CrimeA group within a larger society that shares a distinctive set of values, norms, symbols, and practices. In criminology, the term usually refers to groups whose...