Born Dropped Out

The Hippie Kid Stories

This site is an experiment in new interfaces for documentary video as part of a 2008 NYU Tisch ITP Masters Thesis by Caleb Clark. The short interviews here are of of adults who were children of hippie parents during the late 1960s and early 70s. Each subject recorded their answers to the same 20 questions. This project was featured on Boing Boing.

  • caleb
  • caleb
  • rebecca


The skip icon icon above skips to the next person's interview once you have clicked Play.

Click a person to see all 20 of their answers.

ruth
1969, VW Bus. Europe
play video Ruth
  • Raised in Manhattan and on a commune.
  • Currently a filmmaker and artist living in New York City.
  • Born 1962.
  • Recorded self in April 2008 on Mac iSight Webcam saved to CD.
Ruth


Nathan

play video Nathan

  • Raised in rural Maine.
  • Currently an interactive media producer living in New York City.
  • Born 1970.
  • Recorded by Author in April 2008 with XactiHD on monopole at 720p with wired lavaliere mic.
Nathan


rebecca
play video Rebecca
  • Raised in New England in urban communes and suburbia.
  • Currently a Brooklyn New York based ow
  • ner of an interactive media company.
  • Born 1975.
  • Recorded self in April 2008 with Mac iSight Webcam saved to CD.
rebecca


Gabriel

play video Gabriel

  • Raised in rural Tennessee and Maine.
  • Currently an artist and naturalist living in Brooklyn New York.
  • Born 1979.
  • Recorded April 2008.


Alisa

play video Alisa

  • Raised in Berkeley, CA.
  • Currently in Berkeley, CA, raising two children as a single mom.
  • Born 1962
  • Recorded self in April 2008. Sent in miniDV tape. Author processed for upload.
ALISA


SHANTI

play video Shanti

  • Raised on the road and rural Oregon.
  • Currently...
  • Born...
  • Recorded self in April 2008 in PC Webcam. Used blip.tv "upperblip" to upload directly to account for thesis. Author Post processed.
SHANTI


DAWN

play video Dawn

  • Raised in New Jersey, Arizona and Rural-ish Oregon.
  • Currently a Brooklyn New York based Executive and Artistic Director of a dance/theater/media performance group.
  • Born 1966
  • Recorded April 2008.
DAWN



Caleb

play video Caleb

  • The Author of this thesis, Caleb was raised in San Francisco, a northern California commune, and southern Maine.
  • Currently a New York City based Web media producer.
  • Born 1966.
  • Recorded self in March 2008 with Mac iSight camera at 640px.
Garbiel


Click a question to see each participant's answers.

play video 1) Parents:What were your parents doing before they dropped out? From whence did they come? What was the catalyst? Rich or poor families? Educated?

play video 2) Hippiedom: What is your version of hippie kid-dom? When? (rough years). Who'd you live with? (mom, dad, step?) Where? (Part of world, urban, rural, commune?). When did things get back to "normal"?

play video 3) Health: What about health food? Did you eat strange food? Were you an inside or outside kid? How did this effect you then and now?

play video 4) Education: Was your education different? Do you wish it was different? College?

play video 5) Living: What's up with survival in the real world? How do you make money now? Past jobs? What do you think about money? TV? Media? Games? Toys? Clothes? Cars?

play video 6) Freedom: Is freedom really nothing left to lose? What is your relationship to authority?

play video 7) Good: What was the best part of your childhood? Any cool stories?

play video 8) Bad: What was the worst part? Any not-so-cool stories?

play video 9) Structure: What about structure, discipline and stability when you were a kid? What about raising your own kids? Have any? Want any?

play video 10) Social: Any comments on your socialization, communication, sensitivity, and people skills?

play video 11) Sex: What about free love? Were you around it? Did it effect your parents? Does this effect your relationships and sexuality now?

play video 12) Drugs: Were you around drugs? Does this effect you as an adult? How do you think they affected your parents and the hippie movement?

play video 13) Rock: Did you rock? Did you roll? Did you go to concerts, parties, festivals? What do you think of music now?

play video 14) Politics: What about politics? Did you go to protests? Are you political now? Conservative? Liberal?

play video 15) Religion: Were your parents involved in any religious activities? Are you religious?

play video 16) Rebel : Did you rebel against your parents, or society? If so, how? What do you think your parents were rebelling against? Or dropping out of?

play video 17) Drop-In: Your parents dropped out, but you just dropped in! Have you had to work out any issues that you think are from growing up in a rather rare environment? Do you think that these issues might have been different had you been raised by the same family, but in a more normal way?

play video 18) Misunderstandings: Hippie is now an icon and even a Halloween costume in drug stores. Do you think society has any misunderstandings about hippies? Did your parents have any misunderstandings about your childhood? Do/did you have any misunderstandings (Compassion?) about what what your parents were going through?

play video 19) Hippies: Are you, or have your ever been, a hippie? Are your parents now? Where their different kinds of hippies? Are there any hippies now? Did the hippies change the world?

play video 20) More: Any other comments?