Sociology of ‘Youth Development’

Sociology of ‘Youth Development’

Starting with an Issue

http://www.google.co.nz/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&frm=1&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&docid=s5N3ZP0HewFD8M&tbnid=1Z-2iTjS73G1tM:&ved=0CAUQjRw&url=http://widowsvoice-sslf.blogspot.com/2013/02/suicide-search.html&ei=vGFjUf_0CMiaiQekuoCoCw&bvm=bv.44770516,d.aGc&psig=AFQjCNFz5VkYBFsJ7jnOI2pEZGgJXBQxSg&ust=1365553933518456

• It’s all about YOUth• Issues are looked at in terms of

• Risk/Protective Factors• Developmental

Assets/Competencies• Vulnerabilities• Biological and environmental

influences on development and wellbeing

Youth Development

But are issues like suicide that easy to explain … could there be other explanations?

• Actually … it’s not about you … th• It’s about the organisation of our society (our

community)• It’s about words and groups• The winners and the losers• How deviance is defined• Scripts and the unmarked nature of ‘we’ verses

them’• Youth!!!

The Sociology of Youth

One NZ Treasury: Two Graphs

Source: World Health Organisation (2001)

The international picture in the 1990s

One NZ Treasury: Two Graphs

Source: World Health Organisation (2001)

What is happening here?

Confused?

• Massive social changes• Rise in Deviance• Rise in suicidality• G.S. Hall

• Storm and Stress

• E. Durkheim • Anomie and Social Strain

1800s: G.S. Hall and E. Durkheim

• First sociologist to look at the function of suicide

• Was interested in what keep societies strong and stable especially in times when traditional institutions were no longer ‘strong’

• Focused on structures – a society that pushes collective conformity and greater integration verses a freer society allowing flexible pathways and choices and less connection(integration)

• The place of anomie

E. Durkheim

So, back to Developmental Theories …

• Development theories have a strong whakapapa in western psychological theories• This, in turn, is problematic• Problems tend to be centred in the individual • Some groups are always seen as ‘deviant’• Our cultural theories are just ‘other’ theories

that put the individual in the centre

• All problems can be solved if you work with the individual

• All practice is centred on the individual

But …• Sociological theories are critical analyses of

society, functions and, at times, inequality• Scripts and labels• Structures• Power dynamics• Class, gender, cultural and religious factors • Hegemony• Why do some groups get labelled and others not?• A sociological imagination (Mills)

But what about youth work• Our history tells us a lot!!• We are connected to the whakapapa

of the definition of youth• We are connected to socialisation

‘agents’• The school• The church• The scouts

• Technology and Global Development also play a role YMCA - Wales

Late 1800s/Early 1900s• The west went through

economic/racial upheaval – social evolution was king

• ‘Hooligans’• GS Hall and the invention of

adolescence• The development of functionalist

theories• Compulsory education• The YMCA, Scouts are born

1950s/1960s• Post-war

• The birth of the suburb• The baby-boommers

• Technology and consumerism born• The invention of the ‘teenager’• The Mazengarb report• Erikson and Elkind• The Chicago/Birmingham schools• The leaving age and youth clubs

1970s/1980s• The climax and fall of the ‘modern’ world• Oil Crisis• Welfare reform• The invention of the ‘youth-at-risk’• Longitudinal research• Countercultural movements• Alternative Education• Detached Youth Work• Critical literacy• Academic writing of indigenous health

theories

1990s-2000s• Neoliberalism and the myth of global youth culture• Tomorrow’s Schools/Alt Education redefined• Informal and formal education• Youth work moves from focusing on risk to focusing on ‘civic’

participation• YDSA • Professionalisation of youth work• PYD theories are developed• Cross-sectional research • Cultural theories/Critical theories/Fluid identities• Exploring the power of the post …

"He (Obama) has done nothing for African-Americans. You look at what's gone on with their income levels. You look at what's gone on with their youth. I thought that he would be a great cheerleader for this country. I thought he'd do a fabulous job for the African-American citizens of this country. He has done nothing." (Trump on President Barack Obama. "This Week," 2015)

Today…