hi!! im working on a story that takes place at a 2012 public high school - the issue with that is that i was not in high school in 2012 lmao. do you have any tips on how to keep it feeling realistic?
Well, neither was I!! But here are some tips:
Define Your General Setting
Sure, high school has a different feel compared to an average town/city setting. However, it is still a part of the bigger community, and will be impacted by external factors.
What part of the world are your writing about? What's the general economy like? What's the most common occupation of the kid's parents? What's the prevailing fashion/art/music style?
Your teens will be impacted by the popular culture and trends of the time, so start by outlining the general setting!
I think this is where schools have changed the most. There are going to be some overlaps between early 2010s and late 2000s, so if you think in the direction of Y2K fashion, it should fit.
On a general note, I think 2010s fashion was vibrant, with lots of colors and flashy items...
Side fringes and backcombed/straightened hair were still very popular
most girls had huge messy sock buns on top of their heads
boys had the Justin Bieber cut.
Jack Wills and Hollister were pretty popular, and a lot of girls had a Paul's Boutique jacket and a Jane Norman bag for their PE kit (or one of the Hollister bags with a topless guy on).
Converse were universally cool, and there were lots of imitation brands.
Open flannel shirt over a t-shirt was a pretty popular outfit.
Skinny jeans and band t-shirts
bright chunky rubber band bracelets.
Vans were cool among the alternative kids.
Getting different colours on your braces was cool.
Most of the boys had at least one of those t-shirts with the buttons and the mismatched cuffs.
School-uniform-wise, short ties with big fat knots were cool, and hard kids would pluck a stripe or two out of their tie.
Tucking in shirts was initially not cool, then it became cool to tuck at the front but not the back.
Lots of boys wore black trainers, and lots of girls wore those ballet pumps.
Girls doing their lips with their foundation, with a thick ring of black eyeliner and spidery clumpy mascara - and having a visible orange line where your foundation met your neck was common.
Multiple ear piercings were popular with the alternative crowd
Belly button piercings were big for girls
Just search up some pictures on Google, you should get plenty of "Early 2010s teen fashion starter pack"
Smartphones were already popular, and with the introduction of Snapchat(2011) and Instagram(2010), the social media hype was just starting to boom
Facebook and Twitter were popular - basically everyone was on it
TikTok(2016) and Discord(2015) didn't exist yet
Phones were allowed in the classroom, but phones/laptops weren't an important part of school work like it is now.
Phones-wise, most people had pretty basic dumbphones (although they were just called mobiles back then), and not everyone carried them all the time
Blackberry (BBM), Nokia, LG Cholate, iPhone if you're rich enough
Most kids were on PAYG phones, so you'd run out of credit sometimes (i.e. no more calls or texts) and have to go to a physical shop to top up. Nobody really had data, and there was always a moment of panic if you accidentally opened the web browser on your phone because it was so expensive. Wifi became a thing around 2012.
Nintendo DSes: Mario Kart, Animal Crossing, Nintendogs
iPods or another MP3 Player
Slang-wise, Urban Dictionary is a good resource.
Fleek, peng and YOLO were popular with some crowds. Leetspeak was a thing online, especially in nerdy communities. Emoji were starting to take offÂ
rawr" (or "rawr means I love you in dinosaur") and "xD" as a laughing faceÂ
One Direction, Jedward, Katy Perry, Carly Rae Jepson, Justin Bieber, JLS, Little Mix, Beyonce, Paramour, My Chemical Romance, Bring Me The Horizon, Black Veil Brides, Ke$ha, Eminem, The Killers, OMI, Gotye, Bruno Mars, Macklemore, Skrillex, deadmau5, blink-182, Green Day, Taylor Swift, Lady Gaga, Nicki Minaj, Rihanna, Lana Del Rey.
Twilight was huge, then Hunger Games.
Harry Potter was everywhere all the time, people would go to midnight releases for the books and movies.
High School Musical was popular, then that crowd migrated to Glee and Mean Girls.
The Olympics were in London in 2012
Reese's peanut butter cups, Marshmallow Fluff, Nerds, etc.Â
Veganism wasn't well-known, but still there were a few
Lots of casual homophbia, kids jsut genuinely not knowing rather than truly hateful towards it
Here are some movie suggestions, that shows school like in early-mid 2010s quite well:
For YA Novels - Be Timeless
Before you start doing any of the things above, remember this if you're writing a YA novel: The key of this genre is to feel somewhat timless, taking readers back to their high school years no matter when and where they've gone through it.
High school is the phase where many people feel awkward, unsure of themselves, feeling special in their own head but knowing that they're not really.
And it's not like the problems just disappear when we hit adult life. A major reason why YA novels are so popular is that they address themes that are repeatedly felt by the general human being, often in a such a direct, straightforward way that provides vicarious satisfaction.
