XIX ISA World Congress of Sociology (July 15-21, 2018)

624

Youth Belonging and Citizenship in ‘Globalised Ethnoscapes’

RC34 Sociology of Youth (host committee)

Language: English

The mass movement of people globally has led to the prospect of ‘living permanently with variety and difference’ (Bauman, 2016) and within ‘globalised ethnoscapes’ – Appadurai’s (1996) term to denote the increasingly transnational landscapes of group identity. Such changes have cast doubt upon the connection between identity, citizenship and the nation-state, seeming to necessitate more hybrid and transnational notions of citizen-formation and belonging. Simultaneously, xenophobic policies and far-right political attacks on immigration and the status of refugees globally suggest a retreat from diversity and inclusion, particularly in countries of the Global North.

Young people today are at the forefront of these demographic and social changes. Yet, their voices and experiences have been largely left out of the public discourse, and at times, they have become targets for the anxiety associated with super-diverse (ethnic, religious etc) communities. Moreover, sociological research has often only prioritised the voices of some dominant groups of young people, thus overlooking the marginalisation, citizenship exclusion and symbolic violence experienced by other youth.

This session invites papers which examine what these changing globalised ethnoscapes mean for young people and their sense of belonging and citizenship. Papers are invited that contribute to the following themes:

• Young people, transnational mobilities and citizenship;
• Citizenship and civic participation in global times;
• Structural and symbolic violence and diverse youth;
• Identity, super-diversity and belonging;
• Theoretical contributions relating to citizenship, justice, decolonisation, power,  belonging and identity;
• Changing notions of space and time;
• Challenges to conventional citizenship (e.g. youth activism, etc);
• Other cognate themes or topics.