3. A Sociology of Millennials

This chapter starts with a discussion of the relationship between individuals and society and with marketer/psychoanalyst Clotaire Rapaille’s theory about the way children are “imprinted” by their societies between the age of one and seven. Next I deal with the ideas of Karl Mannheim who focused attention on the social origins of thought. This is followed by a discussion of Gustave LeBon’s classic book The Crowd and how his ideas relate to our interest in Millennials. This leads to a discussion the Claritas typology which posits that there are sixty-six different kinds of Americans; this suggests there are different ways of thinking about people other than in terms of generations. Next, I discuss the economic status of Millennials and the fact that while many of them are financially stressed, some of them are quite wealthy.