Manufactured Dreams: Youth, Consumer Culture and Making of Aspirations

The world is reeling under the strain of geo-political power struggles and the resultant impact on the socio-economic political life. Youth, in our times is going through paradox of easily available choices, a set picture of future which is presented by the glitz of virtual reality and continuous simulation to facing the real world of competition, unemployment, shrinking of opportunities etc. Certain from of ideas, lifestyles, and experiences are easily available for young to consume. In this context, the session we propose seeks to interrogate how consumption practices, material cultures, and market logics shape the aspirational horizons of young people across Global contexts. We ask: What do aspirations mean for the youth in the changing times of Global North & Global South? How do consumer cultures mediate their visions of adulthood, success, and belonging? And do the young people devise mechanisms of negotiation to adjust /adapt their aspirations as per their contextual location?

This session foregrounds sociological dimensions of aspirations among youth of our world—how aspirations are produced, circulated, and constrained through intersecting forces of class, gender, caste, race, geography, and global capital.

The session invites papers engaging with, but not limited to, the following:

• Education for upward mobility- Home vs Abroad
• Material cultures of youth- branded clothing, food and gadgets as access to a cultural capital
• Media representation of aspirations
• Inequality and the aspiration gap
• Gender, consumption, and aspiration
• Counter-aspirations, counter-cultures and subcultures of the youth