What Katniss tells
us about today’s teens
POPSCI: A scientific slant on what’s trending in popular culture
The children of the ‘90s grew up with Harry Potter. Aside from inspiring a £4.7 billion film franchise and 450 million book sales, Harry and his menagerie of magical friends convinced children across the world that anything is possible. They reminded us of the value of friendship, the power of good over evil and ensured us that everything would work out if you follow your dreams. But new research conducted by bestselling author and thinker Noreena Hertz suggests that for those born between 1995 and 2002, there’s a far more relevant pop cultural icon in town.
Having grown up in a landscape of economic strife and political unrest, the children of the noughties have flouted the older generation’s beloved Potter and replaced him with someone who reflects their values. Straight out of District 12, Katniss Everdeen is teenagers’ leading light, with one study showing that their respect for the Hunger Games heroine far outweighs their respect for Hogwarts residents like Harry.
This is a generation who’re worried about the future, both close to home and otherwise. Hertz’s research demonstrates that 66% of teen girls across the US and UK are concerned about climate change and 77% are worried about getting into debt. But they’re not going to sit on their laurels, either. Almost half are so intent on career success that they’re prepared to work round the clock for the next decade to achieve it. And not only is that success actually more important to this group than to older generations, they’re more entrepreneurial, they drink less and they smoke less. They put the rest of us to shame.
With the launch of the Mockingly: Part II trailer sure to get teens pumped for the late-November cinema release — buffering the success of a movie franchise that’s already made almost £1.5 billion in the box office worldwide — the arrow-slinging anarchist they’ve grown to love is only set to become more present over 2015. And as she strives to maintain the moral balance in her fictional dystopia, real-world teens are only set to mirror her behaviour.
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Written by Lore Oxford, deputy commissioning editor at Canvas8
