Contemporary Youth Research

A major new resource book for academics and students of youth studies, this work offers a rare comparative review of a field which is often focused on the local or national situation. Drawing together authors from across the world, the book combines assessments of the theory, methodology and practice of youth research, and the impact of globalization on this field of study. A particular strength of the text is its exploration of theoretical issues of globalization through substantial pieces of empirical work, some of which cover regions frequently overlooked in the international youth research scene, such as South East Asia and Eastern Europe.

Within contemporary youth research there are two dominant streams - a 'transitions' and a 'cultures' perspective. This collection shows that it is no longer possible to understand the experience of young people through these prisms and proposes new conceptual foundations for youth studies, capable of bridging the gap between these approaches.

A cutting-edge study showcases the emergence of contemporary youth activism in the United States, its benefits to young people, its role in strengthening society, and its powerful social justice implications. At a time when youth are too often dismissed as either empowered consumers or disempowered deviants, it is vital to understand how these young people are pushing back, challenging such constructions, and advancing new possibilities for their institutions and themselves. This book examines the latest developments in the field of contemporary youth activism (CYA) and documents the myriad ways in which youth activists are effecting social change, even as they experience personal change. By taking public, political action on a range of intersecting issues, youth activists are shifting their own developmental pathways, shaping public policy, and shaking up traditional paradigms. Section one of the book offers a historical perspective on youth activism in the United States, followed by a discussion of contemporary examples of CYA for social justice. The second and third sections analyze the individual, institutional, and ideological effects of CYA, arguing that youth activism works to promote change at three levels: self, systems, and in the broader society. Readers will come away with a clearer understanding of the many ways in which today's youth activists are working to reimagine and remake American democracy, reawakening the promise of a multi-issue, progressive movement for social justice.

Written in a clear and accessible style, this book presents a broad ranging enquiry into various methodological issues associated with contemporary youth research. Chapters cover a variety of topical areas, including youth transitions, youth in care, drugs, consumption and music. Featuring studies by new and established youth researchers, this book will be an invaluable resource for undergraduate and postgraduate students, and also those carrying out more advanced research, in the fields of sociology, social policy, health studies, cultural and media studies.

The Subcultural Imagination discusses young adults in subcultures and examines how sociologists use qualitative research methods to study them. Through the application of the ideas of C. Wright Mills to the development of theory-reflexive ethnography, this book analyses the experiences of young people in different subcultural settings, as well as reflecting on how young people in subcultures interact in the wider context of society, biography and history. From Cuba to London, and Bulgaria to Asia, this book delves into urban spaces and street corners, young people’s parties, gigs, BDSM fetish clubs, school, the home, and feminist zines to offer a picture of live sociology in practice. In three parts, the volume explores: history, biography and subculture; practising reflexivity in the field; epistemologies, pedagogies and the subcultural subject. The book offers cutting edge theory and rich empirical research on social class, gender and ethnicities from both established and new researchers across diverse disciplinary backgrounds. It moves the subcultural debate beyond the impasse of the term’s relevance, to one where researchers are fully engaged with the lives of the subcultural subjects. This innovative edited collection will appeal to scholars and students in the areas of sociology, youth studies, media and cultural studies/communication, research methods and ethnography, popular music studies, criminology, politics, social and cultural theory, and gender studies.

This collection of fifteen methodological texts by a group of thirty international youth and social researchers is a polyphony of scholarly voices advancing the field of qualitative inquiry in youth studies. The book homes in on ways of adapting, remixing and reconsidering qualitative methods in order to better serve youth researchers in the twenty-first century. The texts included in this collection offer honest and open accounts of searching for, assembling, testing, and rejecting creative, well-known, or unconventional techniques from various methodical homes. As is emphasized in the title, this is not so much an overview as an inquiry into conducting youth research in an environment that is constantly transforming. Researchers are always seeking out the best ways to capture and (co)-produce meaning that can be used for the greater good. This book offers fresh interpretations of, and feedback on, inventive combinations of methods, research questions and theoretical frameworks. It will be of interest to all who work in youth studies and sociology, and particularly useful to postgraduate students, junior scholars, and established researchers seeking to branch out into new terrain.

Written in a clear and accessible style, this book presents a broad ranging enquiry into various methodological issues associated with contemporary youth research. Chapters cover a variety of topical areas, including youth transitions, youth in care, drugs, consumption and music. Featuring studies by new and established youth researchers, this book will be an invaluable resource for undergraduate and postgraduate students, and also those carrying out more advanced research, in the fields of sociology, social policy, health studies, cultural and media studies.

In A Critical Youth Studies for the 21st Century Peter Kelly and Annelies Kamp present an edited collection that explores the challenges and opportunities faced by young people in an often dangerous 21st century. In an increasingly globalised world these challenges and opportunities include those associated with widening inequalities, precarious labour markets, the commodification of education, the hopes for democracy, and with practising an identity under these circumstances and in these spaces. Drawing on contemporary critical social theories and diverse methodologies, contributors to the collection, who are established and emerging scholars from the Americas, Europe, and Asia/Pacific, open up discussions about what a critical youth studies can contribute to community, policy and academic debates about these challenges and opportunities. Contributors are: Anna Anderson, Dena Aufseeser, Judith Bessant, Ros Black, Daniel Briggs, Laurie Browne, David Cairns, Perri Campbell, James Côté, Ann Dadich, Maria de Lourdes Beldi Alacantra, Nora Duckett, Deirdre Duffy, Angela Dwyer, Christina Ergler, Michelle Fine, Madeline Fox, Andy Furlong, Theo Gavrielides, Henry Giroux, John Goodwin, Keith Heggart, Luke Howie, Amelia Johns, Annelies Kamp, Peter Kelly, Fengshu Liu, Conor McGuckin, Majella McSharry, Filipa Menezes, Magda Nico, Pam Nilan, Henrietta O'Connor, Jo Pike, Herwig Reiter, Geraldine Scanlon, Keri Schwab, Michael Shevlin, Adnan Selimovic, Joan Smith, Jodie Taylor, Steven Threadgold, Vappu Tyyskä, Brendan Walsh, Lucas Walsh, Rob Watts, Bronwyn Wood, Dan Woodman, and David Zyngier. A Critical Youth Studies for the 21st Century is now available in paperback for individual customers.