What were group were you in at school? (A sociological question related to tiki culture) - Beyond Tiki

GT Geeky Tiki Member Las vegas Joined: Oct 15, 2002 Posts: 533	GT Geeky Tiki Posted posted on Mon, Oct 17, 2005 10:05 AM What a great thread. I have no idea which group I was in in high school. I think we had alot of lateral mobility. Plus, everybody went to the same giant keg parties, so maybe there were cliques who hung out seperately at the parties, but we were all at the same party. The "groups" that I can recall: (Mixture of urban and rural zoning in Reno, Nevada, class of '77.) Cowboys. Real, honest to gosh cowboys who came to school from the outlying ranch areas. Skoal in the left back pockets, large silver belt buckles, pressed jeans, nice boots, plaid shirts, hats they took off in class. Really a nice bunch. Never saw one be a bully and they were gracious about teaching cool stuff like how to lasso and fix things. Honestly, never a once can I recall one of the cowboys being a bad person. The girl cowboys were called "goat ropers" and as a group were socially assertive - very can-do - and equally enjoyable. As a group, they were great to party with and freely shared their drugs and alcohol with people. We used to waterski in irrigation canals being pulled by pick-up trucks. I tried chew one time and that was enough - but I caught good natured ribbing for the other 3 years and however many days until high school was over. Indians. We were zoned for the local Paiute reservation and those kids were tough! The toughest kids I ever met were the Paiute girls. If someone did one of their group wrong, the whole group would go after the offender. The boys were only slightly less tough. Fiercely loyal to school and each other. They all had good grades and studies in groups. Anyone could hang in the library with them and it made for better grades by osmosis! I was kind of sweet on one of the girls, so I got to hang with them off campus - the reservation was kind of Soviet: all the houses the same, but the families were almost Asian (stereotype) in their expectations of the kids. The reservation was on the edge of a rural'urban border, so they got along well with the cowboys, in case anyone was wondering. Also, they got lots of cheap alcohol and tobacco from the reservation store, so they were right there in the party mix, too! Heads. These kids were the equivalent of the James Dean-like persona. Really kind of proto-grunge. They all hung out between classes in the designated smoking area. Still, they had some great athletes in their group, so there was a constant mix of heads and jocks getting along at school. The heads listened to what would now be called "alternative" music. They had the best musical taste and were the group with all the mix cassettes for the parties. They had access to the most pot, too. I wasn't a smoker (tobacco), so mostly I hung with heads outside school. I think they liked everybody. Jocks. Back in the day, I think every kid in school partied, so the jocks didn't really hang seperately from everybody else. I ran cross country, so they were used to seeing skinny little guys in the locker room during the fall. They did the most "guy bonding," like towel fighting and wrestling, but as a 110 pound scrawny kid, they actually tried to tease and joke around in a way that someone my size could feel part of it all. One of the guys I admired most was our school's best shot putter - he was proto Tony Robbins. Everything was always the greatest and was ALL RIGHT! He could drink a quart of beer without taking a breath, too. So, the jocks were nothing like in those movies. The jock girls were also very academic and hung together with the indians in study hall, so there was alot of overlap between those two groups, which made for much harmony. The "Soshes". Pronounced like the first syllable of soc-ial. This was the group with feathered hair, bith the boys and the girls. They came from the nicer neighborhoods up the hill. Trans Ams and step side pick-ups or vans were the norm. I think maybe this is a group I didn't know more about because I wasn't in their social circle in terms of having to go to catillion (spelling) or taking those night courses in table manners or ballroom dancing. The had debutantes, too! They preferred booze and many times arrived at the parties already drunk because they started in somebody's basement who's dad was away. They had an epidemic of pregnancy, which does bode well in terms of the girls' "giving" nature. They also had the highest mortality rate in our school - the exclusive neighborhoods there and around Lake Tahoe were treacherous, and there were several terribly tragic wrecks involving vans or trucks full of soshes. When I was a freshmen, I fell for a sosh and loved her nadly. Her dad had a McIntosh stereo and drove a Porsche 928 that he let me drive when I was a sophomore. The girl had a big blue Tans Am. She was a great kisser and loved mixing worlds. She was a soprano singer who did opera recitals and then we'd go play the Who at 120dB in her car and relax. As an only child in a privileged family, she didn't fully appreciate her resources and floundered later on. Oops, too much info. Anyway, the soshes were great on a one on one basis or once you knew more than one of them. All in all, the American Pie movies seem to accurately protray their society and proclivities. There were some I didn't like, but I can recall no outward antagonism. Nerds. Nerds loved Tolkien and Star Trek and what used to pass for a computer. They were into D&D, too. D&D overlapped with the heads, which made for hard partying nerds, so they were more a type of person within the milleau rather than being aseperate entity. Even the nerds who didn't party came to the parties to hang. Car guys. They lived for cars, but like the cowboys, would be the first to run to help if someone in the parking lot had car trouble. They'd hang 'til all hours in the school shop, sneaking beer and working on projects. Our school had a night education thing so the shop was open at all hours. They came across like that club of guys in Grease. They's all be listening to Social Distortion and working solely on muscle cars in my "where are they now" scenario. ROTC. We called them "rotsies." Their world was strange and unfamiliar to me, but they were all very pleaseant. One of them became our school president in senior year. Three of my ROTC friends were gay/lesbian, which seemed quite a coincidence, so I wonder again if I was fully aware of their social structure. The times weren't as open as they are now, but we could go and hang out at ROTC headquarters and sneak beers and tequila (they specialized for some reason) after cross country. The art crowd. Still more beatnik than goth, but they were the ones who were into the script of the Godfather movies and were in love with Joel Grey and all things "Cabaret." At one point, I had a crush on a girl who was into acting, so I went to alot of plays. I was in two plays, but the repetition of doing eight shows and trying to make each one seem spontaneous would have driven me to destruction. Nice group. No prima donnas that I can recall - more like a giant mutual support group. They hung out and liked to recite Mony Python to each other and talk about "film." They were into tragedy, as well, and partied fatalistically. One kid died of an alcohol OD after dramatically swigging a near-quart of tequila and locking himself in his parents' basement. Two of them discovered "needle" drugs and drifted away from school and got arrested in San Francisco. It was quite a scandal! As a whole, I think of them as a group of Sylvia Plath's - kinda fragile and at day's end most interested in the drama that was uniquely their life, but nice. Black kids. I lived in a mixed neighborhood, so I always thought black kids were just part of the mix. This worked out well, because our high school was only about 4% black, so when we all showed up from our neighborhood in a mixed crowd, there was no seperate group to make, socially. I mention this group only because nowadays I wonder if it went so smoothly because people of that skin tone were such a "novelty", so to say. I will not judge how things went with other school areas with kids who grew up surrounded only by their own color. I do think our neighborhood produced kids who were used to people looking differently than one another, which was all to our psychic benefit. OK, that was way too long, but y'all stirred up fond memories. All in all, I would say I was a social dabbler. I'd find people who interested me and then hang out. I liked being with mixtures of people and colors. Maybe I was never embedded in a group enough, mentally, to notice the drama that I see in the movies or hear about from modern kids. I think drugs, alcohol, the western tradition of self determination and politeness, and recognizing early on that group studying made things go smoother made high school very nice. Also, I started working at a record store when I was a sophomore, so I got to see many many of my classmates when they came in and we'd talk tunes and crank whatever music they were into - it probably turned out to be a great social lubricant! That being said, I never did manage to get a diploma, but that's a whole 'nother story. [ Edited by: Geeky Tiki 2005-10-17 10:09 ]

What a great thread.

I have no idea which group I was in in high school. I think we had alot of lateral mobility. Plus, everybody went to the same giant keg parties, so maybe there were cliques who hung out seperately at the parties, but we were all at the same party.

The "groups" that I can recall:

(Mixture of urban and rural zoning in Reno, Nevada, class of '77.)

Cowboys. Real, honest to gosh cowboys who came to school from the outlying ranch areas. Skoal in the left back pockets, large silver belt buckles, pressed jeans, nice boots, plaid shirts, hats they took off in class.

Really a nice bunch. Never saw one be a bully and they were gracious about teaching cool stuff like how to lasso and fix things. Honestly, never a once can I recall one of the cowboys being a bad person. The girl cowboys were called "goat ropers" and as a group were socially assertive - very can-do - and equally enjoyable.

As a group, they were great to party with and freely shared their drugs and alcohol with people.

We used to waterski in irrigation canals being pulled by pick-up trucks. I tried chew one time and that was enough - but I caught good natured ribbing for the other 3 years and however many days until high school was over.

Indians. We were zoned for the local Paiute reservation and those kids were tough! The toughest kids I ever met were the Paiute girls. If someone did one of their group wrong, the whole group would go after the offender. The boys were only slightly less tough. Fiercely loyal to school and each other. They all had good grades and studies in groups. Anyone could hang in the library with them and it made for better grades by osmosis! I was kind of sweet on one of the girls, so I got to hang with them off campus - the reservation was kind of Soviet: all the houses the same, but the families were almost Asian (stereotype) in their expectations of the kids.

The reservation was on the edge of a rural'urban border, so they got along well with the cowboys, in case anyone was wondering.

Also, they got lots of cheap alcohol and tobacco from the reservation store, so they were right there in the party mix, too!

Heads. These kids were the equivalent of the James Dean-like persona. Really kind of proto-grunge. They all hung out between classes in the designated smoking area. Still, they had some great athletes in their group, so there was a constant mix of heads and jocks getting along at school.

The heads listened to what would now be called "alternative" music. They had the best musical taste and were the group with all the mix cassettes for the parties. They had access to the most pot, too.

I wasn't a smoker (tobacco), so mostly I hung with heads outside school.

I think they liked everybody.

Jocks. Back in the day, I think every kid in school partied, so the jocks didn't really hang seperately from everybody else. I ran cross country, so they were used to seeing skinny little guys in the locker room during the fall. They did the most "guy bonding," like towel fighting and wrestling, but as a 110 pound scrawny kid, they actually tried to tease and joke around in a way that someone my size could feel part of it all. One of the guys I admired most was our school's best shot putter - he was proto Tony Robbins. Everything was always the greatest and was ALL RIGHT! He could drink a quart of beer without taking a breath, too.

So, the jocks were nothing like in those movies. The jock girls were also very academic and hung together with the indians in study hall, so there was alot of overlap between those two groups, which made for much harmony.

The "Soshes". Pronounced like the first syllable of soc-ial. This was the group with feathered hair, bith the boys and the girls. They came from the nicer neighborhoods up the hill. Trans Ams and step side pick-ups or vans were the norm.

I think maybe this is a group I didn't know more about because I wasn't in their social circle in terms of having to go to catillion (spelling) or taking those night courses in table manners or ballroom dancing. The had debutantes, too!

They preferred booze and many times arrived at the parties already drunk because they started in somebody's basement who's dad was away. They had an epidemic of pregnancy, which does bode well in terms of the girls' "giving" nature.

They also had the highest mortality rate in our school - the exclusive neighborhoods there and around Lake Tahoe were treacherous, and there were several terribly tragic wrecks involving vans or trucks full of soshes.

When I was a freshmen, I fell for a sosh and loved her nadly. Her dad had a McIntosh stereo and drove a Porsche 928 that he let me drive when I was a sophomore. The girl had a big blue Tans Am. She was a great kisser and loved mixing worlds. She was a soprano singer who did opera recitals and then we'd go play the Who at 120dB in her car and relax. As an only child in a privileged family, she didn't fully appreciate her resources and floundered later on.

Oops, too much info.

Anyway, the soshes were great on a one on one basis or once you knew more than one of them.

All in all, the American Pie movies seem to accurately protray their society and proclivities.

There were some I didn't like, but I can recall no outward antagonism.

Nerds. Nerds loved Tolkien and Star Trek and what used to pass for a computer. They were into D&D, too. D&D overlapped with the heads, which made for hard partying nerds, so they were more a type of person within the milleau rather than being aseperate entity. Even the nerds who didn't party came to the parties to hang.
Car guys. They lived for cars, but like the cowboys, would be the first to run to help if someone in the parking lot had car trouble. They'd hang 'til all hours in the school shop, sneaking beer and working on projects. Our school had a night education thing so the shop was open at all hours.

They came across like that club of guys in Grease. They's all be listening to Social Distortion and working solely on muscle cars in my "where are they now" scenario.

ROTC. We called them "rotsies." Their world was strange and unfamiliar to me, but they were all very pleaseant. One of them became our school president in senior year. Three of my ROTC friends were gay/lesbian, which seemed quite a coincidence, so I wonder again if I was fully aware of their social structure. The times weren't as open as they are now, but we could go and hang out at ROTC headquarters and sneak beers and tequila (they specialized for some reason) after cross country.
The art crowd. Still more beatnik than goth, but they were the ones who were into the script of the Godfather movies and were in love with Joel Grey and all things "Cabaret."

At one point, I had a crush on a girl who was into acting, so I went to alot of plays. I was in two plays, but the repetition of doing eight shows and trying to make each one seem spontaneous would have driven me to destruction. Nice group. No prima donnas that I can recall - more like a giant mutual support group.

They hung out and liked to recite Mony Python to each other and talk about "film."

They were into tragedy, as well, and partied fatalistically. One kid died of an alcohol OD after dramatically swigging a near-quart of tequila and locking himself in his parents' basement. Two of them discovered "needle" drugs and drifted away from school and got arrested in San Francisco. It was quite a scandal!

As a whole, I think of them as a group of Sylvia Plath's - kinda fragile and at day's end most interested in the drama that was uniquely their life, but nice.

Black kids. I lived in a mixed neighborhood, so I always thought black kids were just part of the mix. This worked out well, because our high school was only about 4% black, so when we all showed up from our neighborhood in a mixed crowd, there was no seperate group to make, socially. I mention this group only because nowadays I wonder if it went so smoothly because people of that skin tone were such a "novelty", so to say. I will not judge how things went with other school areas with kids who grew up surrounded only by their own color.

I do think our neighborhood produced kids who were used to people looking differently than one another, which was all to our psychic benefit.

OK, that was way too long, but y'all stirred up fond memories.

All in all, I would say I was a social dabbler. I'd find people who interested me and then hang out. I liked being with mixtures of people and colors. Maybe I was never embedded in a group enough, mentally, to notice the drama that I see in the movies or hear about from modern kids.

I think drugs, alcohol, the western tradition of self determination and politeness, and recognizing early on that group studying made things go smoother made high school very nice.

Also, I started working at a record store when I was a sophomore, so I got to see many many of my classmates when they came in and we'd talk tunes and crank whatever music they were into - it probably turned out to be a great social lubricant!

That being said, I never did manage to get a diploma, but that's a whole 'nother story.

[ Edited by: Geeky Tiki 2005-10-17 10:09 ]

Post #193102 by Geeky Tiki on Mon, Oct 17, 2005 10:05 AM