Potápky ("The Grebes") or bedly ("The Parasol Mushrooms") were a Czech urban

youth subculture Youth subculture is a youth-based subculture with distinct styles, behaviors, and interests. Youth subcultures offer participants an identity outside of that ascribed by social institutions such as family, work, home and school. Youth subcultures ...

primarily defined by the interest in

American culture The culture of the United States of America is primarily of Western, and European origin, yet its influences includes the cultures of Asian American, African American, Latin American, and Native American peoples and their cultures. The U ...

, primarily in

swing music Swing music is a style of jazz that developed in the United States during the late 1920s and early 1930s. It became nationally popular from the mid-1930s. The name derived from its emphasis on the off-beat, or nominally weaker beat. Swing bands ...

. It corresponded to the subcultures of ''

Swingjugend The Swing Youth (german: Swingjugend) were a group of jazz and swing lovers in Germany formed in Hamburg in 1939. Primarily active in Hamburg and Berlin, they were composed of 14- to 21-year-old Germans, mostly middle or upper-class students, ...

'' (literally "Swing Youth", commonly translated as "Swing Kids") in

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

and ''

zazou The zazous were a subculture in France during World War II. They were young people expressing their individuality by wearing big or garish clothing (similar to the zoot suit fashion in America a few years before) and dancing wildly to swing jaz ...

'' in

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

at the same time period.Petr Koura,
Swingová mládež a nacistická okupační moc v protektorátu Čechy a Morava''
("The swing kids and the Nazi occupational power in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia"), Ph.D. Thesis, 2010"Protektorátní školák a jeho volný čas"
("A Student in the Protectorate and His Free Time") Potápky were distinguished by their eccentric fashion (" zoot suit", deformed hat, colored socks), long hair, body postures, and slang. As with many youth subcultures it was characterized by the rebellion against the older generation, and during the

Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...

occupation (

Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia The Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia; cs, Protektorát Čechy a Morava; its territory was called by the Nazis ("the rest of Czechia"). was a partially annexed territory of Nazi Germany established on 16 March 1939 following the German oc ...

), by rebellion against the Nazis.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Potapky Swing music History of subcultures Musical subcultures Czech culture Czech youth culture Americana in the Czech Republic World War II resistance movements

See also

References