We, The Shadow Generation

Karen von Hahn, in todays Globe and Mail writes a My Generation : The Shadow Generation! (In reaction to an set of articles in the pervious week like : Baby Boomer). To Young to be boomers, to old to be Gen X; Born in the early Sixties we watched the Love-in’s, learned the lesson’s it taught, dreamed its promise, and believed the truths it told, but when we arrived for our moment, the boomers had turned to yuppies, love could kill you, the Space Race was dust, and you still have it deal will the Man. Don’t call me a boomer. Their experiences aren’t mine.

Question: what becomes a Shadow Generation? Certainly the first half of the 60’s, and I’m willing to extend it to include the last half as well : the first being in the shadow on the Boomers, the second in the shadow on the Gen-X’s.

Also Boomer/Shadow/X-gen is mostly a North American thing, although Europe had similar if different experiences (and different again depending on which side of the Iron Curtain you lived on); China is different again (the Cultural Revolution begin the dividing line ( see red guard generation) and the little emperors”) . Every large culture has it major demographic events. What are the similar divides, and what are they called, in other countries like Australia, Japan, Britain, Brazil?