Growing up can be a little bit scary and weird.
Kayla, Eighth Grade
A couple of weeks ago saw the UK release of Bo Burnham’s excellent Eighth Grade. A coming of age drama/comedy which follows thirteen-year-old Kayla (Elsie Fisher) as she makes her way through the last week of middle school. Eighth Grade ticks all the boxes of a coming of age film. However there’s something that is distinctively different about Burnham’s film which marks something rather significant: Generation Z is beginning to grow up.
Eighth Grade is not the only recent coming of age film which marks generation Z’s transition from childhood to adulthood. Films like Love, Simon (2018), Blockers (2018), Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), and The Edge of Seventeen (2016), have all address the concerns and anxieties of generation Z. Considering that the protagonists in these films range between thirteen to seventeen years of age, they fall into the bracket known as Generation Z.
Defining who belongs in the demographic cohort known as Generation Z is not an easy task. Being the cohort after the Millennials, Generation Z is often referred to as ‘Post Millennials’. The Pew Research Center defines an individual who belongs to Generation Z as someone who was born from 1995 onwards.
This date range was chosen for its “key political, economic and social factors”, including September 11th terrorist attacks. Post-Millennials would have been seven years of age or younger at the time of the attacks, so having little or no memory of the event. The cut off year to be classed a Generation Z is less clear, with the date ranging from 2009-2014.
With their world being so connected, there’s an incredible amount of pressure on Generation Z individuals to record every aspect of their lives…With so much of their personality being tied with social media, is it any wonder that these teenagers are in crisis?”
Thirteen year old Kayla in Eighth Grade would fall into the Generation Z cohort, with her birth year being 2005. Seventeen year old Simon (Nick Robinson) from Love, Simon would have been born in 2001. Seventeen year old Nadine (Hailee Steinfeld) from The Edge of Seventeen would have been born in 1998. Each one of these characters has grown up in a post 9/11 world, with social media, and smartphones.
With their world being so connected, there’s an incredible amount of pressure on Generation Z individuals to record every aspect of their lives. Generation Z have a ‘digital bond to the Internet’. With so much of their personality being tied with social media, is it any wonder that these teenagers are in crisis and trying to find their true identity?
In fact, depression is quite common among those belonging to Generation Z. In 2018 Pew polled 920 Americans aged 13-17, with a total of “70% of respondents thought anxiety and depression were a major issue.”
Certainly we see this ‘digital bond’ as well as the anxieties of this generation in Eighth Grade . The film opens with Kayla doing a monologue for the camera, a nice use of breaking the fourth wall. It is revealed that she is recording a video for her YouTube channel (her videos rarely get any views). The purpose of Kayla’s video is about ‘being yourself’ and she tells her audience not to worry about what others think.
However, Kayla is constantly worrying about what her peers think of her. She is not alone in her social anxiety, a study found that Generation Z is the most anxious to date. “87% of young people admitted they are worried about something in their lives, with appearances being their biggest concern”.
Like many young women, Kayla is concerned about her appearance. She spends her morning applying makeup (using a tutorial video on YouTube), only to take a photo and upload to Snapchat with the comment ‘Ugh. I woke up like this.’ We know this is a lie, but this is the image Kayla is so desperately trying to project to the world.
As Burnham explained in an interview, “Kids act like their own publicists…we’re all acting like celebrities and commodifying ourselves.’’ Burnham adds that, “The majority of the people on the internet are people expressing themselves and not being heard. The internet is a really beautiful place with so much raw emotion.” Kayla is one of these people using the internet in order to put herself out there to be noticed.
“Eighth Grade touches upon how Gen Zers process information and the world around them, but Burnham seems critical about this generation’s approach.”
Kayla mostly communicates with her peers through social media, her phone is everything and when she breaks it by accident. In her response to this we see her pain and anger, it is as if she has lost part of her identity. The average Gen Zer received their first mobile phone at age 10.3 years and uses their smartphones 15.4 hours per week—more than any other type of device. So is it any surprise that Kayla reacts this way, when it is essentially hardwired into her very existence?
In a later conversation with some older teenagers, she reveals that she has had Snapchat since fifth grade, meaning she would have been between ten or eleven years old at the time. Kayla has grown up with social media. To her Facebook is considered too out-of-date, and we are told ‘No one uses Facebook anymore.’ Studies have shown that Facebook has reportedly been dropping in popularity among teens since 2015.
Eighth Grade touches upon how Gen Zers process information and the world around them, but Burnham seems critical about this generation’s approach. Multitasking is a major part of how Gen Zers operate during their days, and that their attention spans are now considered much shorter. This is beautifully illustrated in the dinner scene where Kayla can’t stop using her phone during a meal with her father (Josh Hamilton). Her father tries to have a conversation, however Kayla is irritated by the disruption.
“Seeing films like Eighth Grade emerging onto our screen is an exciting next stage in the evolution of the coming-of-age film.”
Burnham implies that this generation is losing their ability to verbally communicate. They are essentially losing their ‘voice’. In an interview, Burnham expressed that Generation Z seem “desperate” in the way they articulate themselves. Hence the reason for Kayla’s vlogs as she’s desperately trying to get her voice out there and reassure herself at the same time.
Seeing films like Eighth Grade emerging onto our screen is an exciting next stage in the evolution of the coming-of-age film. This narrative is not necessarily a new one, it has existed before 2019. In fact it has existed long before the birth of cinema, and is perhaps is something that we can all relate to on an universal basis.
Personal growth and change is an important characteristic of this genre. In Eighth Grade Kayla has her own personal growth, coming out of her shell and more importantly reconnecting with her father.
As Generation Z begins to transition into adulthood, we can probably expect to see more coming-of-age films featuring a Gen Zer as their protagonist. If these films tackle the same themes seen in Eighth Grade, they will be a great tool for the Generation Z audience to help them process this transition.
Generation Zers may the most anxious, but they are the most optimistic about the future compared to the likes of millennials and Gen Xers. Generation Z may have learned valuable lessons by observing the past mistakes of the generations that have come before. But Eighth Grade suggests that there is still much to be learned by all of us regardless of whatever generation we belong to.
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