Everything about Generation totally explained
Generation (from the
Greek γενεά), also known as
procreation, is the act of producing
offspring. It can also refer to the act of creating something inanimate such as
electrical generation or
cryptographic code generation.
A generation can also be a stage or degree in a succession of natural descent as a grandfather, a father, and the father's son comprise three generations.
A generation can refer to stages of successive improvement in the development of a
technology such as the
internal combustion engine, or successive iterations of products with
planned obsolescence, such as
video game consoles or
mobile phones.
In
biology, the process by which populations of
organisms pass on advantageous
traits from generation to generation is known
evolution.
Length
A
generation has traditionally been defined as “the average interval of time between the birth of parents and the birth of their offspring." This places a generation at around 20 years in span and this matches the generations up to and including the
Baby Boomers. However, while in the past this has served sociologists well in analysing generations, it's irrelevant today.
Firstly, because
cohorts are changing so quickly in response to new technologies, changing career and study options, and because of shifting
societal values, two decades is far.
Secondly, the time between birth of parents and birth of
offspring has stretched out from two decades to more than three. Looking at
Australian statistics, the median age of a woman having her first baby was 24 in 1976, while today it's just over 30.
UK - 27.4
So, today a generation refers to a cohort of people born into and shaped by a particular span of time (events, trends and developments). And the span of time has contracted significantly.
Generational labels
The various labels given the living generations – the Builders through to Gen Z – reflect the times which have shaped their generational profile. The names given the Builders reflect the events that shaped them (the World Wars and the Depression); the Boomer labels, the population boom following World War II and the shedding of moral codes after the sexual revolution of the 60s and 70s (the love generation and the lost generation, for example); the X-er labels, the material prosperity of the times (the options generation) and the after-math of the sexual revolution (the baby-busters), and the Gen Y labels, the digital age that heralded in its birth.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Generation'.
|
External Link Exchanges
Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:
<a href="http://generation.totallyexplained.com">Generation Totally Explained</a>
Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned. |
