Post 70s, Post 80s, Post 90s - how does it work?

[imron]

It just doesn't really make much sense to me to define a generation by the decade somebody is born in. Like somebody else said, I think it's more defined by what era you grew up in.

Yes, but the decade you were born in essentially determines the era you grew up in, so really it's the same thing.

[mouse]

The fact that China has changed so much and so rapidly also makes it pretty reasonable to go by decades, as differences between decades are striking. But as someone else said above, this is not unique to China. I guess none of you ever see those posts on facebook or tumblr that say "only 80s kids will remember this" or "like if you're a 90s baby" etc. As for whether it's a communist thing, I fail to see the connection.

[abcdefg]

I've been wondering why this discussion has pretty much left me cold, but I just figured it out. The time scale involved is too small. It's like the playground clique of 8 year old's not wanting to talk to a kid who is only 61/2 or 7. They perceive the age gap as huge.

By contrast, my contemporaries and I prefer to use a broader time frame: pleistocene, cretaceous, jurassic, and cambrian for starters. We are prehistoric.

[wannabechinaman]

^Yeah, but 80s babies and 90s babies in the West are still typically both put under the "Gen Y" umbrella. I don't think they're seen as being completely different generations the way Baby Boomers are seen as different from their parents. More like older/younger siblings/sub generations.

[skylee]

The whole concept of 剩女 is terrible and deserves a separate topic.

Some use 盛女 instead, which is much more positive.

[Angelina]

I'm definitely switching to using 盛女.

[Ruben von Zwack]

This 剩女/盛女 thing is new to me, but I have a bad feeling I may know what it means. Back when I studied Japanese our Japanese teacher one day jokingly said, women are like "kurisumasu keeki - not good anymore after 24". Totally disturbed me, until this day.

But times are changing, I know so many unmarried women (Taiwanese, not mainland, curiously) in their late 20s and early 30s, people will have to get their heads round to that.

[skylee]

The Japanese saying of christmas cake is so old.

[wannabechinaman]

Just out of curiosity - what generation/decade are all of you? I would be "post-90s" as I was born on January 16, 1990. If I were Chinese though, I'd be pretty insulted if someone thought I had more in common with 14 year old kids than with 24 year olds

[imron]

I'd be pretty insulted if someone thought I had more in common with 14 year old kids than with 24 year olds

How would that be any different from say early Gen Xers vs later Gen Xers? And it would be an even larger gap for the baby boomers.

[Johnny20270]

born on January 16, 1990.

I was applying for university that year

[wannabechinaman]

Baby Boomers and Gen X don't have precise boundaries, that's the difference. For example all the years from 1960 to 1964 are mixed territory (birth control pill came out in 1960 but wasn't commonly used until a few years later), same with the late 70s/early 80s in regards to Gen X and Gen Y and the mid and late 90s in regards to Y and Z. So that avoids any ridiculous conceptions of being more akin to someone 8-9 years younger vs a few months older.

[Lu]

Just out of curiosity - what generation/decade are all of you? I would be "post-90s" as I was born on January 16, 1990. If I were Chinese though, I'd be pretty insulted if someone thought I had more in common with 14 year old kids than with 24 year olds

But that's not how those terms are used anyway. Nobody is going to call you 九零后 unless jokingly. It's not a word to pigeonhole individuals, it's a word used to attempt to say something about the changing of times and large groups of people and their relationship to other large groups of people. The Aeon article mentioned is very good.

I was born in the eighties but when I once said something to an overseas Chinese friend about 'people from our generation', meaning people such as she and I and young Taiwanese of comparable age, she laughed at it and said that people from such completely different places can't really be said to belong to the same generation. I suppose she had a point.

[wannabechinaman]

Is there overall more of a divide between post 80s and post 90s, or between people born before 1980 vs after 1980?

Also are post-2000s stereotyped in any way yet or are they just too young?

[michaelf]

It's interesting how in China they tend to have the same stereotypes about older and younger people, like old people are stuffy/conservative/uncool and young people are rebellious/tech obsessed/narcissistic etc. Of course these stereotypes are never true but yeah.