Generacion X

Gen X is the generation born after the Western post-World War II baby boom describing a generational change from the later Baby Boomer cohort who were born in the late 1950s.[8][9][10][11][12][13][14]

Gen Xers have cultural perspectives and political experiences that were shaped by a series of events. These include post-assassination of John F. Kennedy government and culture, the Vietnam War, Watergate, the presidency of Jimmy Carter, Pope John Paul II, the presidency of Ronald Reagan, the 1984 Summer Olympics, the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster, the Chernobyl disaster, Black Monday, the election of George H.W. Bush, the fall of the Berlin Wall and the subsequent end of the Cold War, the launch of the Hubble Telescope, the savings and loan crisis,[15] the election of Bill Clinton and the 1990s economic boom, the longest recorded expansion of GDP in the history of the United States.

Other events include the Iran hostage crisis, the AIDS epidemic, the War on Drugs, the Persian Gulf War, the rise of the internet and the Dot-com bubble, the emergence of new wave music, electronic music, synthpop, glam metal, pop punk, alternative rock, grunge,[16]rap music and hip hop.[17][18] They were often called the MTV Generation.[19]

In the preface to Generation X Goes Global: Mapping a Youth Culture in Motion, a collection of global essays, Professor Christine Henseler summarizes it as "a generation whose worldview is based on change, on the need to combat corruption, dictatorships, abuse, AIDS, a generation in search of human dignity and individual freedom, the need for stability, love, tolerance, and human rights for all."[20]

In 2012, the Corporation for National and Community Service ranked Generation X volunteer rates in the U.S. at 29.4% per year, the highest compared with other generations. The rankings were based on a three-year moving average between 2009 and 2011.[21][22]

In American cinema, directors Quentin Tarantino, David Fincher, Steven Soderbergh,[23] Kevin Smith,[24] Richard Linklater[25] and Todd Solondz[26] have been called Generation X filmmakers. Smith is most known for his View Askewniverse films, the flagship film being Clerks, which focused on a pair of bored, twenty-something convenience store clerks in New Jersey circa 1994. Linklater's Slacker similarly explored young adult characters who were more interested in philosophizing than settling with a long-term career and family. Solondz' Welcome to the Dollhouse touched upon themes of school bullying, school violence, teen drug use, peer pressure and broken or dysfunctional families, mostly set in a junior high school environment in New Jersey during the early to mid-1990s.[27]

Compared with previous generations, Generation X represents a more apparently heterogeneous generation, openly acknowledging and embracing social diversity in terms of such characteristics as race, class, religion, ethnicity, culture, language, gender identity, and sexual orientation.[19]

Unlike their parents who challenged leaders with an intent to replace them, Gen Xers have a less prominent tendency to idolize leaders and a greater tendency to work toward long-term institutional and systematic change through economic, media and consumer actions.[28]

The U.S. Census Bureau reports that Generation X statistically holds the highest education levels when looking at current age groups: U.S. Census Bureau, in their 2009 Statistical Abstract.

The 2011 publication "The Generation X Report", based on annual surveys used in the Longitudinal Study of today's adults, finds that Gen Xers, who are defined in the report as people born between 1961 and 1981, are highly educated, active, balanced, happy and family-oriented. The study dispels the materialistic, slacker, disenfranchised stereotype associated with youth in the 1970 and 80s.[29] Various questions and responses from approximately 4,000

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