Alternative spatial styles. An exploration of socio-spatial youth cultures in a metropolis

Studies on youth cultures, since the beginning, have underlined that style is a core issue for the analysis and understanding of these phenomena. Style, variously defined over time, in general refers to the set of cultural elements which – through a practice of selection, re-appropriation, re-signification and alternative use – enables each specific youth culture to develop individual and collective processes of identification, distinction, and recognition. Whereas studies on subcultural styles have mainly focused on objects, actions, attitudes and language, following Dutton’s terminological proposal of “socio-spatial subcultures” we will explore how today urban space represents a pivotal dimension of some youth cultures. On the basis of a qualitative research in Turin, Northern Italy, entailing in-depth interviews, ethnographic observation, document and new media analysis, we will explore three case-studies of subcultural practices defined by different uses of urban space: urban sports, in particular skateboarding and parkour, creatively using urban architectural components without materially transforming them; graffiti writers, who modify the surface of urban architecture; and squatting, introducing a material transformation of urban space. By comparatively analysing these three empirical cases, we will show the “alternative potential” of each practice in redefining meanings and uses of urban space. Our main interpretive perspective is that we are witnessing a shift from youth cultures gaining visibility and recognition by performing their alternative practices in the urban space as a stage and as a container (what we label as a “spatialization of styles”) to youth cultures actively interacting, both symbolically and materially, with (and not only within) urban space as a key element of their style's construction (what we label as “stylization of space”). Therefore, we will show how skaters, traceurs, writers and squatters, in their different ways of re-signifying and using urban space, construct their identities and distinctiveness through their spatial styles.