Post #1929703

The sociological idea of “generations” as historically shaped cohorts in modern theory is only about a century old. Karl Mannheim’s The Problem of Generations was written in the late 1920s and became foundational for thinking about generations as social-historical groups, not just biological succession. The popular mass-label convention like “Baby Boomers,” “Gen X,” “Millennials,” “Gen Z” are mostly post-WWII, and really takes off in the late 20th century. “Baby boom” came from the post-1946 birth surge; “Generation X” was popularized by Douglas Coupland’s 1991 novel, Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture; It was Strauss and Howe’s concepts on generations helped popularize a grand generational framework in U.S. culture. Though they did not coin the terms themselves.