Out of the Basement: Youth Cultural Production in Practice and in Policy

Soulja Boy, Justin Bieber, and Tavi Gevinson are hardly representative of typical youth experiences, but their origins highlight many of the realities of youth doing independent creative work. Out of the Basement profiles the variety of youth cultural production in the twenty-first century, and asks what has - or has not - changed as youth attempt to make a living from creative works.

Though any young person with a laptop might have greater means to make music, films, or publish writing than...