Gothic Scholars Don’t Wear Black Gothic Studies and Gothic Subcultures

are hardly in touch with each other. This is something that should ideally change in the near future, since Gothic Studies and Gothic youth subcultures greatly overlap, at least as regards their common interest in Gothic literature, the iconography and the non-literary texts (films, comics, and so on) derived from it. The multiplicity of texts generated by Gothic, understood here as a narrative mode stretching across two centuries, are both an object of research for Gothic scholars and a source of inspiration for the members of the Gothic youth subcultures. The Gothic roots of these subcultures are, clearly, most perceptible in the dark sounds and dark lyrics of their musical production, ranging from heavy metal to Goth passing through industrial music. Yet, Gothic as such extends its influence to other aspects of these subcultures. Their members often link the consumption of certain musical styles to the pursuit of an alternative lifestyle including characteristic fashions, clubs to socialise in, and underground or alternative media to keep the scene alive. No Gothic scholar has so far explored in depth the links between these diverse youth subcultures (especially heavy metal and Goth) and their Gothic background. Yet, if Gothic youth subcultures can be regarded as the practical result of a particular interpretation of the philosophy of Gothic texts, and Gothic texts are the field of research of Gothic Studies, Gothic youth subcultures – themselves producers of new Gothic texts – could (perhaps should) be also part of Gothic Studies. In this way this conspicuous gap in the contemporary fund of knowledge about Gothic would be filled. Despite the desirability of a closer approach, there are, however, many difficulties to integrate the study of booming underground contemporary youth subcultures like these within an academic project which generates mostly official knowledge about the past. It cannot be argued that Gothic Studies frontally opposes the integration of Gothic youth subcultures in its field of research; indeed, this is not an issue. The issue is, rather, that important research methodological problems are turning Gothic youth subcultures into potent generators of unofficial Gothic Scholars Don’t Wear Black