Don’t fit the generational mould? You could be a ‘xennial’
We’ve had the Baby Boomers, who were followed by Generation X. Then came millennials and, after them, the less discussed Generation Z.
Just when you may have begun to understand what marketing people, sociologists and pollsters were talking about, however, it’s all changing.
A new name has been added to the host of generational labels. More accurately, it has been hewn from two others.
Meet the xennials, the subgroup of 30-somethings who think they merit a title all of their own.
It is a very tightly defined group. To qualify, xennials must have been born between 1977 and 1983, which means their ages span from 34 to just about 40. They may not be quite as cynical as Gen Xers but they pride themselves on being significantly less entitled and optimistic than millennials.
What, then, is so special about xennials? Their answer is that they were the last generation to grow up before the digital age – they had analogue childhoods but digital adulthoods.
They remember family telephones on hall tables or in sitting rooms, TV channels they could count on one hand, receiving letters and birthday cards by post, and making arrangements in advance when meeting friends.
They have adapted to technology, but had to do so as adults. Most were established in jobs at the time of the financial crash in 2008-09.
This makes them different from self-oriented millennials, who grew up with smartphones and have graduated into a much tougher labour market, but also from Generation X.
Like any self-respecting microgroup, they have their own cultural references. They watched the original Star Wars trilogy on video, and were fans of the Mickey Mouse Club TV show and, particularly, the 1990s teen drama My So-Called Life.
Josephine Hansom, director of research at specialist polling company Youthsight, says xennials are ‘‘a group who enthusiastically embraced MySpace, MSN and mobile phones in their 20s while still remembering what it was like to organise their first date as a teenager using the landline’’.
An interesting aspect, she says, is that their identification as a group challenges the view that youth culture is defined by the political or economic climate in which people grow up, instead suggesting a moment when technological disruption shifted our everyday experiences.
The intellectual godfather of xennials is widely seen to be Dan Woodman, an Australian academic at Melbourne University who was born in 1980, slap bang in the middle of the cohort, and has written books about the sociology of generations, although he did not coin the term xennial himself.
‘‘I think there is something to the idea of generations, but the ways we define them are too blunt and homogenising, and hence was open to the idea that there is room for more nuanced categorisations,’’ Woodman says. ‘‘The idea clearly resonated with people.
‘‘The grain of truth in generations, which we seem to be drawn too, is that we are shaped by our time and place.
‘‘Lots of people did not feel that the characterisations out there fitted them. I think this is why the term has taken off.’’
Why is it that people take comfort in such labels? Psychologist Wendy Lyons says they answer a fundamental human need, although they can also perpetuate unhelpful stereotypes.
‘‘People want to feel part of a societal group like this because they have an intrinsic motivation to affiliate and be socially accepted. Not only do many people like to categorise themselves, but they love labelling other people. Categories and labels help simplify the world and provide shortcuts for dealing with people.’’