Poverty, migration and sex work: youth transitions in Ethiopia

Despite an emerging body of work on youth transitions, research has yet to explore the often unconventional routes to adulthood for young people marginalised through poverty. By drawing on interviews with 60 young commercial sex workers in Ethiopia, this paper explores the connections between poverty, migration and sex work and demonstrates that sex work provides a risky alternative, but often successful, path to independence for some rural–urban migrants. The paper concludes by offering recommendations for policies that seek to support young sex workers by enabling them to maintain their independence while seeking different employment.     

‘Through children’s eyes’: childhood, place and the fear of crime

This article seeks to bring young respondents more sharply into focus by considering fear of crime ‘through children’s eyes’. By incorporating children’s perspectives it is argued that more inclusive and integrative community safety initiatives may arise. Inspired by the recent flowering of research undertaken in childhood studies by social and cultural geographers, the study seeks to make a theoretical, empirical and spatial contribution to debates in the field. Based on the findings of a large-scale school survey, the responses indicate that children have an acute place-based sensitivity to a range of highly relevant community safety issues. This includes detailed reflections concerning the place of policing, boredom, youth gangs, motorcars and drugs in their neighbourhoods. It is suggested that the inclusion of children’s accounts into geographical debates not only enriches our knowledge of childhood studies, but also adds detail and texture to our understandings of fear of crime.     

Respect, deference, respectability and place: What is the problem with/for working class boys?

The rise of the notion of ‘respect’ is a key part of the agenda for the third term of the British New Labour Government, first elected in 1997. Here I consider its relationship to and differentiate it from the idea of respectability - a term that has long been used to divide the working class - and consider the links between deference and respect. While the claim that working class youth, especially boys, are ‘disrespectful’ has a long history, I argue that the current focus on respect not only continues this association but also illustrates a deep ambivalence at the heart of the New Labour policy agenda, an uncertainty about the status of young people and a denial of their moral agency. Furthermore, there is a continuation in this agenda of a long-standing designation of certain areas in cities as places to avoid, associated with a disreputable working class population.     

Exploring Youth Cultures Geographically Through Active Learning

Abstract

This paper presents strategies for actively involving students in studying cultural geography through a research project on youth cultures. It provides a basic framework to investigate selected “subcultures” focusing on the origin and diffusion of each culture, its material and non-material aspects and the attributes and meanings of spaces used by each cultural group and youth cultures in the context of change. Students used a variety of methodologies to gather data and to describe and analyze the cultures selected. Of the eleven youth cultures investigated by the class, examples from the cultures of raves, skateboarding, and the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) are selectively presented to elucidate their geographic characteristics.     

Living austerity urbanism: space–time expansion and deepening socio-spatial inequalities for disadvantaged urban youth in Ireland

After the 2008 financial crisis, Ireland implemented a severe austerity program which drastically reshaped the opportunities and constraints experienced by youth living in disadvantaged urban neighborhoods. Rising unemployment, reduced social welfare, and funding cuts for support organizations limited the opportunities of urban life for disadvantaged youth. This article uses the experience of austerity urbanism of young adults from Ballymun (Dublin) and Knocknaheeny (Cork), both among the most disadvantaged neighborhoods of their cities, to argue that austerity, through time-space expansion, removes services, facilities and opportunities from deprived urban neighborhoods, thus reinforcing and intensifying socio-spatial inequalities. In an effort to bring State finances under control and to revitalize the economy the whole urban fabric, and the urban population, is managed for the purpose of economic recovery. Urban life becomes restricted as disadvantaged urban youth becomes socially and spatially excluded from vital urban opportunities and amenities.     

Labor Market Marginalization of Youth in San Antonio,Texas

Poverty among inner-city residents is associated with their marginal status in the labor market. Marginalization in the labor market begins during youth when important educational and employment decisions are made. Analysis of 1990 U.S. Census tract data for San Antonio, Texas identifies the lack of a high school diploma, poverty, non-employment, and non-enrollment in school as conditions of marginality for youth. Spatial patterns of youth labor market marginalization show concentrations in the inner city and in sectors on the West, South, and Eastside. Regression analysis reveals that levels of youth marginalization are associated with neighborhood context represented by the employment, behavioral, and ethnic characteristics of the overall residential population of a census tract.