Elderly “rockers” and eternal youth: preliminary reflections

Abstract

This exploratory and qualitative research seeks to develop a discussion about rock, youth and elderly and their relation to negative stereotypes regarding “being old” and “being a rocker”. Four São Paulo natives over 60 years old who consider themselves “rockers” shared their perceptions from individual, semi-structured interviews based on their “rock and roll” lifestyle and this social and cultural movement originally classified for youths. This study also investigated how they deal with the desire of “eternal youth”, common in some rock and roll culture manifestations and general conceptions around the struggle against aging. In the respect of elderliness, the four participants pointed out negative aspects, such as physical limitations, and positive aspects, as such as maturity and life experience. On one hand, they affirm that they had never had a desire for eternal youth, yet on the other hand, they also had never stopped feeling young because they consider themselves youthful spirits. Then, they consider that even if youth is a chronological and passing stage, it can also be, if one decides, a permanent, spiritual state. Despite the fact that they are not musicians, they see themselves as “rockers” because they like that genre of music or because they had lived the majority of their lives in the rock era and have memories related to this culture. Another reason was the fact of one can have his/her social life revolving around rock, including in family relationships. They all are categorically affirming that nowadays rock is for all ages. In conclusion, the interviewees denied the desire for eternal youth, however they did not consider themselves elders, which appears to be a paradox. These results lead us to consider new questions such as: would the feeling of “youthful spirit” be more frequent in elders who consider themselves as rockers? If we were dealing with professional rock musicians, would their feelings about youth and old age be different from those of the non-professional rockers?