Generation_X

Generation X Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture. By Douglas Coupland. (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1991). Coupland illuminates the nineteen eighties by utilizing characters Andy, Clair, and Dag to construct a literary portrait of their generation. The job market, consumerism, and literary terms each contribute to identifying the 1980s generation that came of age. Generation X presents the post baby boomer generation who lost the “genetic lottery” causing job dissatisfaction, baby boomer resentment, and the search for something different. Dag’s story illustrates the X generation job market headed by those such as his boss, which Dag explains “Now, Martin, like most embittered ex-hippies, is a yuppie, and I have no idea how you’re supposed to relate to those people.” Dag furthers yuppie classification as, “Dickoids like Martin who snap like wolverines on speed when they can’t have a restaurant’s window seat in the nonsmoking section with cloth napkins” (21). As his story continues in the chapter titled “Quit Your Job” Dag reflects baby boomer resentment but first he explains to Dickoid Martin, “Well, if I’m going to quit anyway, might as well get a thing or two off my chest.” Following Dickoid’s (Martin) astonished response generation, x, job, dag, andy, martin, explains, consumerism, claire, literary, baby, think, terms, story, market, jobs, about, yuppie, theme, something, search, really, quit, occupational, marketing, low, important, history, each, different, dickoid, dag’s, boomer, age, advertising/marketing, world