Alternative  

From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia

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This page Alternative is part of the politics series.
Illustration:Liberty Leading the People (1831, detail) by Eugène Delacroix.

"Hell" detail from Hieronymus Bosch's Garden of Earthly Delights

This page Alternative is part of the publication bias list of the Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia, presented by Alfred Jarry.

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Alternative means relating to a choice between two or more possibilities. It can also refer to something not traditional, outside the mainstream or underground (e.g., alternative medicine, alternative lifestyle, alternative rock).

Alternative can refer to:

Alternative society

alternative society

Alternative societies have been proposed at least since the 19th century when Karl Marx (1818 – 1883) and Proudhon (1809 – 1865) represented two factions for alternative visions of social change.

Philosophers who suggested alternative models for society included: Charles Fourier (1772-1837), Robert Owen (1771-1858), Louis Blanc (1811-1882), Louis Auguste Blanqui (1805-1881) and Wilhelm Weitling (1808-1871). The background of alternative social thinking stems largely from the history of utopianism.

There is a considerable overlap with the history of counterculture.

Alternative culture

alternative culture

Alternative culture is a type of culture which exists outside or on the fringes of mainstream or popular culture, usually under the domain of one or more subcultures. These subcultures may have little or nothing in common besides the relative obscurity of their culture, but cultural studies uses this common basis of obscurity to classify them as alternative cultures, or, taken as a whole, the alternative culture. Compare with the more politically charged term, counterculture.

Alternative lifestyle

alternative lifestyle

An alternative lifestyle is a lifestyle (a mode or style of conducting one's life) which carries the implication that it is not within the generally perceived cultural norm. Usually, but not always, it implies an affinity or identification within some matching subculture (examples include Hippies, Goth and punk). Traditionally not all minority lifestyles are held to be "alternative"; the term tends to imply newer forms of lifestyle, often based upon enlarged freedoms (especially in the sphere of social styles) or a decision to substitute another approach or not enter the usual expected path in most societies.

The following may be examples which are considered by some to be examples of alternate lifestyles:

• Unusual lifestyle or community, such as communes .
• Avoidance of traditional path, such as people who might be said to become Hippies, artists or poets in preference to the norm.
• Vegetarianism or veganism
• Alternative medicine
• Alternative spirituality practices.
• Unusual sexual lifestyle, such as BDSM, swinging or polyamory.
• Unusual cultural focus, such as furry fandom
• Hooliganism or Casual culture.

Alternative lifestyles are sometimes thought be an expression of social rebellion. Some psychologists today, however, believe that alternative lifestyles are not rebellious in nature but only serve to help the individual find balance, or social or personal identity, in what they characterize as a confusing and often brutal world, especially one that seems harmful or wrong and which they lack power individually to change. This is considered by some to be nothing more than an excuse for deviant behavior.

Alternative media

alternative media

Alternative media are defined most broadly as those media practices falling outside the mainstreams of corporate communication.

Proponents of alternative media often argue that the mainstream media is heavily biased, criticizing their pretended objectivity as a dissimulation of class biases. Causes of this bias include the political interests of the owners, government influence or a profit motive. This criticism springs from observers of all political orientations. The concentration of media ownership, as well as the concentration of the publishing industry are other causes of economical censorship. While sources of alternative media are also frequently highly (and sometimes proudly) biased, the bias tend to be different, hence 'alternative'.

Alternative sexuality

alternative sexuality

Alternative sexuality, sexual lifestyles that fall outside the sexual norm

Etymology

From Middle French alternatif, from Medieval Latin alternativus, from the participle stem of Latin alternāre (“to do by turns”). Compare alternate.

See also

• There is no alternative
• Alternative country
• Alternative dance
• Alternative hip hop
• Alternative rock
• Alternative comics, a genre of comic strips and books
• Alternative culture, a variety of subcultures existing along the fringes of mainstream culture
• Alternative fashion, for example Gothic fashion, Punk fashion, Fetish fashion
• Alternative medicine, healing practice that does not fall within the realm of conventional medicine