3. MODS
Mod (from modernist) is a subculture that
originated in London, England in the late
1950s and peaked in the early-to-mid 1960s.
Mods were scene riding scooters such as
Vesper's, they wore parker jackets and
listened to ska music typically.
Other things associated were pill popping with
purple hearts and they tended to like beanies.

4. • Significant elements of the mod subculture include: fashion (often
tailor-made suits); pop music, including African American
soul, Jamaican ska, and British beat music and R&B; and Italian
motor scooters.
• Male mods adopted a smooth, sophisticated look that emphasised
tailor-made Italian suits (sometimes white) with narrow
lapels, mohair clothes, thin ties, button-down collar shirts, wool or
cashmere jumpers (crewneck or V-neck), pointed-toe leather shoes
that were nicknamed winklepickers, as well as Chelsea or "Beatle"
boots, Tassel Loafers,Clarks' Desert Boots even Bowling shoes, and
hairstyles that imitated the look of the French Nouvelle Vague
cinema actors of the era, such as Jean-Paul Belmondo.

5. The conflict
• The Mods and Rockers were two conflicting British youth subcultures of the early-mid 1960s. Gangs
of mods and rockers fighting in 1964 sparked a moral panic about British youths, and the two
groups were seen as folk devils.
• The rockers adopted a macho biker gang image, wearing clothes such as black leather jackets.
• The mods adopted a pose of scooter-driving sophistication, wearing suits and other cleancut
outfits. By late 1966, the two subcultures had faded from public view and media attention turned
to two new emerging youth subcultures — the hippies and the skinheads.
• Rockers, who wore leather jackets and rode heavy motorcycles, poured scorn on the mods, who
often wore suits and rode scooters. The rockers considered mods to be weedy, effeminate snobs,
and mods saw rockers as out of touch, oafish and grubby.
• Mod or Rocker - 'You had to be one or the other '
• The Mods had designer suits, Italian scooters and The Who. Rockers had leathers, motorbikes and
Elvis.
• For a few years in the early 1960s, the two groups represented a sharp division in British youth
culture.
• Their rivalry often spilled over into violence, and the 1964 holiday weekend clashes in resort towns
on the south coast terrorised local residents and outraged much of the nation.
• But soon after the seaside riots of 1964, this volatile split in British teen life faded away.
• Musically, there was not much common ground. Rockers listened to 1950s rock and roll, mostly by
white American artists such as Elvis Presley, Gene Vincent and Eddie Cochran.

6. Media Portrayals
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zn5vYOwCTak
• http://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/forty-years-
ago-pictures-of-mods-and-rockers-shocked-polite-society-
but-were-they-staged-by-the-press-558818.html
• Newspaper accounts from the mid-1960s focused on the
mod obsession with clothes, often detailing the prices of
the expensive suits worn by young mods, and seeking out
extreme cases such as a young mod who claimed that he
would "go without food to buy clothes".
• http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/may/18/
newsid_2511000/2511245.stm