Alien
Species
Communicating with Tweens = Communicating with
Aliens.
by Marcel Danesi
PARENTGUIDE News March 2004
With their own peculiar ways of talking and acting,
tweenagers seem to belong to a race apart. Communicating
with them frequently appears, in fact, to constitute
an encounter with an “alien” species.
Why? Have pubescent children always been this
way? Or, is the so-called “tweenager”
a product of the modern world?
Troublesome and rebellious youths have always
existed. Herodotus (circa 485-425 BC), the Greek
historian, tells of a Sumerian father who carved
in stone a portrait of his bored and defiant son
four millennia ago. But tweens today live in a
culture that is vastly different— a culture
that sees boredom and defiance as “natural”
features of maturation. Of course, nature has
a role to play in adolescence, producing those
“raging hormones” that seem to have
pubescent children on a leash. But, ultimately
it is culture that shapes the coming-of-age period.
Painting a portrait of the tween “alien
species” was the objective of a fact-finding
project I undertook with several research assistants
at the University of Toronto a few years ago.
What we found was that, in many ways, the tweens
of today are no different from the tweens of yesterday—
their parents and even grandparents! This is so
because it has become an economic imperative of
the modern world. Ever since adolescence became
a primary target of the media and the entertainment
industries in the mid-1950s, tweenagers have been
good for business. It is no exaggeration to claim
that the foundations of our current economy are
largely implanted in the terrain of adolescence.
Trends start and end there. Pop culture and teen
culture have become virtual synonyms.
Whether we were immersed in Elvis culture, disco
scenes, punk culture or a hard rock lifestyle
is irrelevant. The point is we adults today were
once perceived as “difficult works-in-progress,”
rather than as “finished products,”
by our parents and teachers. I can recall my late
mother cringing at my tastes in clothing and music
when I reached the age of 13 in the late 1950s.
I dismissed this at the time as “adult insanity.”
I now fully appreciate what she must have been
going through. Most people alive today have grown
up in a culture that has become accustomed to
seeing tweenagers as “alien” creatures
who are impelled by nature to be that way—
temporarily at least.
Adolescence has always been about hanging out
with peers, going to parties, smoking cigarettes,
consuming alcohol, engaging casually in sexual
activities and making one’s physical appearance
different from that of adults. It should thus
come as no surprise to find that today’s
tweens have their own clothing fashions and music,
and that they continue to see themselves as distinct
from adults. But there is one crucial difference.
In no other era has the tendency for lifestyle
fads to pass quickly from the tween culture to
the adult one been so strong.
As a consequence, differences between young and
old have become blurrier than ever before. A mother
could wear her 12-year-old daughter’s clothes
without getting a second look and, vice versa,
the daughter could wear her mother’s clothes
without appearing in no way to be precocious.
Having a “cool look” at any age has
become the defining mindset of the modern world.
As a consequence, the figure of the wise elder
has faded away from communal consciousness. People
now turn to the media, to psychologists or to
self-help books for advice. But these are hardly
adequate replacements for the wisdom that comes
from experience.
Adolescents need and expect adults to be adults.
This has several implications
that I believe may be useful (if not vital) for
parents who truly want to bridge the communication
gap that may exist between themselves and their
tweenagers.
• Above all else, it is totally unnecessary
(and it may be even counterproductive) to
attempt to talk and look like one’s tween.
Influenced by current cultural trends, we assume
that becoming like our tweens will bridge the
gap that may exist. Nothing could be further from
the truth.
• Tweenagers are “mature” individuals.
Once puberty arrives, children have the ability
to think and act responsibly. They must therefore
be perceived and treated like mature and responsible
individuals. They cannot simply be told what is
best for them and what to do. Adolescents want
a relationship with parents that is different
from what it was when they were children. They
hate being called “kids.”
• Tweenagers should never be labeled as
“weird” or “bizarre.”
Not only does this have no meaning to them, but
it also ignores the fact that tween lifestyle
choices are products of social forces that are
beyond anyone’s control. One must, however,
keep a close eye on peers, for peer pressure can
influence a young person to leave home, to join
a gang or cult, to take drugs or to take upon
himself some perilous risk. The good news is that
such pressure weakens considerably in the later
stages of adolescence, as the research team found.
Thus, the operative word here is, and always has
been, “patience!”
• Family arguments over such things as clothing,
friendships, musical tastes, and the like, are
common. These are, and have always been, destructive
events. What makes every tween’s blood boil
are expressions such as “When I was your
age...” and “Young people today, do
not understand.” The moralizing tone in
such phrases only increases the “emotional
noise” in communications; and this leads
in turn to confrontational behavior.
• Tweens often do things that seem to be
dangerous or silly. But reprimanding them is useless.
Don’t use “I told you so!” A
better approach would be to react as one would
to another adult: “Be careful next time.”
Simply put, tweenagers must be treated like the
mature individuals they are.
As a final word, we must never forget that tweens
have an awful lot of things to say that are meaningful
and even profound, no matter how they phrase their
thoughts. We should always listen to them with
an open mind and avoid being judgmental. And,
above all else, we must communicate with them
in a mature and “dignified” manner.
In his great novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, the British
writer George Orwell saw language as the key to
ethical and consequential communication. The worst
world in which one could possibly live, he emphasized,
is one in which people turn instinctively to trendy
new words, yet end up saying virtually nothing
of value. Only language that is honest, straightforward
and kindhearted will have a lasting and meaningful
effect on people. That is certainly the case when
it comes to communicating with tweens today.
Marcel Danesi
is professor of Anthropology and Communication
Theory at the University of Toronto. He teaches
courses on youth culture and is actively involved
in researching youth trends. His recent book,
My Son Is An Alien: A Cultural Portrait of
Today’s Youth (Rowman & Littlefield),
is an an entertaining and informative look
at today’s youth based on interviews
with teens, tweens and parents.
