



One way or another, skinhead culture has been with us since the 1960s. Since skinheads can range from white supremacist to avowedly anti-racist, it’s a slippery thing trying to define a group with as much internal variation as that. And yet…

It’s safe to say that skinheads were strongly influenced by the rude boys of Jamaica and the mods of London and that it is primarily a working-class phenomenon as well as a reaction to the long-haired hippie types. You see, long hair and factory labor with a lot of large and powerful moving machine parts isn’t a good idea. (Also, you can wear your steel-toed workboots on the job, no problem.)

Furthermore, in London at least, working-class whites tended to share the same working-class neighborhoods with new immigrants from the Caribbean, and that exposed them to lifestyles and fashions defined by soul, ska, and reggae. And then somewhere along the line the boots and braces become the uniform of a racist subculture.

Having delivered that preamble, here are some striking images of skins, both male and female, from the 1970-1990 period.

Click on the images for a larger view.



















































via Mashable



Previously on Dangerous Minds:

Skinheads, 1979-1984

(Way more than) Everything you always wanted to know about the Nazi Skinhead music scene

