I would definitely say Gen X. To me, it’s comfortably Gen X. I grew up with Strauss and Howe (famous for their generational theories) being taught in sociology, and, for them, Gen X (which they originally called 13th Gen – it wasn’t until Douglas Coupland’s early-90s book Generation X that the term became widespread) was defined as 1960 - 1981, and that’s the dates I go by. I have a friend who was born in 1963, and he very much struck me as a Gen Xer rather than a baby boomer. We shared similar cultural milestones, he was part of the Seattle music scene that is so solidly identified with later Gen X (hell, his band was briefly in the Seattle music documentary Hype!), etc.
Of course, it’s all arbitrary and it’s more a continuum – you can sub divide generations as finely as you want. Strauss and Howe themselves split Gen X into “Atari wavers” and “Nintendo wavers.” I was born in 1975 and I consider myself on the tail end of Gen X. I would place something like 1969/1970 as dead center.
Also note that in Douglas Coupland’s book Generation X, the characters in the novel were all late twenty-somethings, and the novel came out in 1991. Meaning that it would have been written, at best, in 1990, so his characters would have been born in the early 60s.
Being born in 1968, I’ve known that I am what was called Generation X. But I understand how the O.P. can wonder … do I fit there?
I’m supposed to understand, being Generation X makes me like the characters in the film Reality Bites. Now, as much as I admire Winonna Rider’s acting ability, and always enjoyed the humor of Jeannine Garafalo, I don’t really think I fit into the dispair those people in the film seem to be in.
I’m embarrassed that it took me half a season of the TV show Friends to realize – that it was Reality Bites watered down for network TV. But there are the three “successful” characters – Ross, Monica and Chandler, lost in their lack of happiness despite their straight career trajectory, and Phoebe, Joey and Rachel confused by where they are to go now that they’re “grown-up.”
But yeah, lots of the early children of the baby boomers, or the children of WWII kids (like my parents,) fall under Generation X. The press noticed, at that time, even more cultural floundering than Baby Boomers or even later generations.
I like the definition of Millennials as born last century graduated high school this century. That gives a start date of 1981 as the earliest and '82 before it really starts and then depending on how you want to count ends in 1999 or 2000. I tend to define Gen as the group between Boomers and Millennials so they get 1964-1981 since the Boomers seem pretty fixed in my mind at 1946-1964.
Millenials are basically defined by 9/11 and growing up as the internet was exploding. Generation Z doesn’t remember before 9/11 or social media. As previously mentioned the Boomers are pretty well defined by the end of WWII. Gen X is fuzzier on either end, I think.
I would say the defining trait of Generation X is their familiarity with computers by the time they were in college. I was at the tail end of the generation that wrote its undergraduate theses on Smith-Corona typewriters. Personal Computer ownership became commonplace around 1985, Windows usage and Mac ownership were commonplace around 1990, and internet usage became commonplace around 1995. In the late 90s, colleges began to recommend that students leave their desktop computers at home and bring laptops to school.
By contrast, the Baby Boomers were defined by drug use and draft eligibility, and Millennials learned to read with computers and had little experience with tactile newsprint newspapers. Also, Boomers first heard about AIDS well after their first sexual experiences, and first heard about Ecstasy after they graduated from college (and had an opportunity to use it while it was still legal).
Boomers vividly remember floppy disks (A drive). Gen X-ers remember 3.5 inch diskettes (B drive). Millennials have no clear memory of anything before CD/DVD disks (Drive C).
I was born in '75 and I grew up (well, after I was about 10 or so) with floppy 5.25" disks. C64, Apple ][e, etc. I actually didn’t even own a computer through my college years, but became familiar with 3.5" disks in the early 90s.
I’ve noticed that one thing that makes a difference for those born during the transition years between generations is the presence of older siblings. I’m a solid GenX but have a younger sibling born in '81. He definitely considers himself more of an X than a Millennial and I think part of that was probably the strong presence of Gen X pop culture in the house during his formative years. I never hesitate to remind him of that, either
Yup, another 1980-born here** and we occupy this weird sliver that’s best described as “an analog childhood but a digital adolescence.” We had card catalogues at the library when we were little kids … but the Internet was available and becoming common for general use by the time we were in high school. We grew up juuuuuust in time to ride our bikes around until sundown (i.e. before 24-hour news and associated scaremongering) and vividly remember societal norms before vs. after 9-11 … but we instinctively Google something whenever we have a question.
Just a bit too old to identify with Millennials but not old enough for the defining characteristics of Gen X.
** posting that doesn’t totally compromise my identity or permit easier password cracking, right?
I was born in 1980 and I identify as more as a Millennial, mostly because when the term “Gen X” was first coined (or at least when I first started hearing it) it seemed to refer to people who were in their 20s or even early 30s when I was still in high school.
Case in point: “The Amendment Song” from the Simpsons episode “The Day the Violence Died.” In the middle of it Bart and Lisa have this exchange:
Bart: “What the hell is this?”
Lisa: “It’s one of those campy '70s throwbacks that appeals to Generation X-ers.”
Bart: “We need another Vietnam, thin out their ranks a little.”
Since I wasn’t alive in the '70s, a “'70s throwback” isn’t really something that would appeal to me. And that episode aired in 1996, when I was 16 (actually looking at the exact air date I was still 15). Too young to serve in the military, so “another Vietnam” wouldn’t have affected me (unless it was still going on when I turned 18, of course). Therefore I felt like I must not be part of this generation Bart and Lisa were complaining about.
The Simpsons thing is just meant to be one example, but when I was younger and people talked about “Generation X” it almost always seemed to be referring to people older than me.
I’m one of those Boomer/ Gen X hybrids- born in 1963. I always kinda identified with Boomers; I remember when Woodstock happened, the moon landing, Vietnam, Nixon. I don’t remember JFK because I was two months old.
However, lately I’ve been realizing that my thinking and attitudes have been more Gen X. it’s just that my cultural experiences are more Boomer. I figure I can take the best of those generations and leave what I don’t want.
It’s funny. Using Kenobi 65’s chart, my parents are Silent Gen (1939) and my siblings and I are (kinda) Gen X. We skipped the Boomers. My kids are early Gen Z (1997 and 2001)
Which is why I object so much to being called a Boomer now.
I was born at the end of 59, so at the time the "baby boom’ was over, and I wasn’t called a boomer when young. But the effect of that was that I was looking for work when all the jobs had been taken by the population surge of people 5-10 years older than me. And when I got work, all the promotion opportunities had been taken by people 5-10 years older than me. And now, when the ‘boomers’ are retiring with the assets they have acquired over a lifetime of full employment and an expanding economy, I’m still working and still in a lower-paid cohort.
So when the marketing people are talking about the ‘boomers’ and what they want and what they have and what kind of market they form… they aren’t talking about me. I’m included in the ‘boomer’ market by virtue of the fact that my ‘bust’ generation isn’t important enough to have a separate market category.
Thank you for the informative and entertaining conversation. I suppose my wife, sister and I are Generation X. I do think culture has a lot to do with it. My parents, born near the beginning of WWII (my dad in October of 41, so right before), were Chicago liberals who moved to Austin in 1962 to go to graduate school. I was born in 67 and grew up as an Austin liberal. I think I participated in some anti-war protests when I was an infant. I remember war being on the news and I remember the Watergate hearings, though I was too young to understand either. I remember a moon launch, though I’m sure it couldn’t have been Apollo 11.
What about large families? My dad is the oldest of five boys and my mom the oldest (and only girl) of three. So, they both have siblings that land squarely as Boomers, even though they were born within a twelve-year span to the same sets of parents. My dad was subject to the draft, but he got classified as a conscientious objector. I have uncles who served, though.
Technology is simply miraculous. As a teenager, I went to the Perry-Casteneda Library on the campus of the University of Texas at Austin and felt like I was in the presence of the total of human knowledge. Today, I walk around with access to all human knowledge in my pocket.
The teenagers I work with today see 9/11 as just another historical event that will be on the semester exam. They weren’t even born yet. Their moms weren’t even pregnant yet.
I am still glad that the moon landings took place within my lifetime, even though I was very young at the time(s).
My freshman year of college (1986-87), I ran across the descriptor “baby busters” to describe the generation I was in. As in, the bust after the boom. I have identified as a “baby buster” ever since.
Another '63er checking in. I always felt I had more in common with the GenXers than the Boomers. Didn’t grow up with computers but took to them quickly during and after college. That seems to be one of the defining attributes of GenX (embracing technology).
I think another marker of Gen X is being pretty accustomed to economic upheaval. We got used to recessions and market shifts during our formative career building years and ride them out with world weary ease.
I was born in 1964, my parents in 1942.
So they’re technically too old to be boomers, but they grew up with all the cultural touchstones of baby boomers. My grandfathers fought in WWII, so they’re definitely the Greatest Generation.
I was born after JFK’s assination, I remember the college protests and Vietnam war on the news. I watched the first moonwalk on TV right after I turned 5 years old. I listened to Watergate on the radio and watched Nixon’s resignation speech on TV.
Punk rock was the most rebellious thing around when I was in high school. I’m gonna say that if Punk rock was an underground, rebellious thing when you were in junior high/high school and pissed off your dad and made your mom scared, you are Generation X.
If you identify with “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” or “The Breakfast Club”, you might be an older Gen Xer, If you identify with “Singles” or “Reality Bites,” you might be a younger Gen Xer.
Yeah, I was born in 1982, and never felt like I belonged to any named generation. Which is fine, because it’s about as useful as my star sign.
When I was a kid, Gen X was the older teenagers and young adults I looked up to. Specifically, I remember being in grade school when Nirvana and grunge were the cool new music scene, and Generation X was all the guys old enough to go to Pearl Jam concerts and date women who looked like Liz Phair. The people who finished high school in the 80s. I was definitely not that generation.
But Millennials were school kids on September 11th, and I was already in the Army by then. So I can’t be that either.
When I was younger “Generation Y” was bandied about for my age group, and I thought it was terribly derivative. Are we going to name all generations after letters now, starting with X? But nobody talks about Gen Y anymore.
So, I throw my hands up and reiterate that this generation stuff is all zodiac/personality test style hogwash.
