Examining the Past

The label 'teenagers' has been in use since WW2.

It has connotations of...

• Lazy
• Dis-obedient
• Ill-mannered
• Hooligans
• Violent
• Rebellious

Many of these are explored in Matt Wolf's documentary 'Teenage' (2014)

http://www.empireonline.com/news/story.asp?NID=39768

• No hope
• Reckless
• Wild
• Miss-understood
• Creative
• Jitterbugs
• Hooligans

The representation of teenagers by adults- consistent from generation to generation over the centuries (Plato 400bc - 

'love luxury, bad manners, contempt for authority, disrespect elders, love chatters, tyrants, don't rise for elders, contradict parents, gobble up dainties, cross their legs, tyrannise their teachers.')

Similarly the representation of teenagers by themselves or by sympathetic adults ('Quadrophenia' (1979) This is England (2006). 

Media Arc - Dan Gardner author of 'Risk: the science and politics of fear' (2009) - only certain representations will be made by the media depending on what fits with their existing narratives about that group/event.