Youth, Communication and Social ChangeYouth, Communication and Social Change- negotiating, navitaging and narrating youth lives in a glocal reality- negotiating, navitaging and narrating youth lives in a glocal reality

bybyProf. Thomas TufteProf. Thomas Tufte

Roskilde University, DenmarkRoskilde University, Denmark

Presentation given at Encuentros 2010, Cambridge University, 5 August 2010Presentation given at Encuentros 2010, Cambridge University, 5 August 2010

Litterature reviewLitterature review- 3 strands of research- 3 strands of research

• a celebratory perspective: creativity, active involvement, e-participation and interactivity

• a perspective of ’critical youth’ and ’youth resistance’: youth response to disempowering situations

• an everyday perspective: ethnographic studies of subjectivities in the making and identity negotiation

Guiding assumptionsGuiding assumptions

1. there continues to be a lack of deeper empirical explorations of youthful realities

2. most studies in this field lack trans-disciplinary perspectives in their design

3. there is a lack of action orientation in how we conduct and use our research

4 questions4 questions

1. What characterizes the lives of youth today?

2. What are some of the key contexts influencing youth lives today?

3. How do we conceptualize youth?

4. What are some of the emerging research challenges

Youth, Communication and Youth, Communication and Empowerment in BongolandEmpowerment in Bongoland

• Bongo – being ’street smart’

• Tanzania:– Democratic development since early 90ies– Growing civil society– 3% internet access– 50% mobile phone access– 6% annual economic growth– 6.2 HIV prevalence

Bongo FlavaBongo Flava

In Bongo things are super, that’s no lie.Even if sometimes Bongo is bitter like a sponge

(…)‘Bongo of today isn’t like in the old days:Even the old grannies become prostitutes

(…)No respect, a corrupted game is played in society.

No obedience to the teachings of the prophets.And pick-pockets are burned like animalsOthers sent to court that didn’t even steel.

Who will know if the law is in people’s hands?People in Bongo, why no humanity in your hearts?

(in Ekstrøm 2010: 135)

People Speaking Back? People Speaking Back? Media, Empowerment and Democracy in East Africa Media, Empowerment and Democracy in East Africa

(MEDIeA)(MEDIeA)

• Target group: Young women and social inclusion

• Problem: Lack of voice and participation in public life

• Key question: How do civil society-driven media platforms contribute, or not, to young women’s engagement in participatory governance?

Case: Femina HIPCase: Femina HIP

• Tanzanian NGO, 1999-• Focuses on reproductive

health and HIV/AIDS• Edutainment through real

life stories• Media outlets include:

Two large magazines, tv talk show, radio drama, interactive website

• Femina clubs

FEMA and other media outletsFEMA and other media outlets

• FEMA (170.000 copies 4x pr year). Secondary school youth

• SiMchezo – out of school youth

• Tv talk show• Radio drama• 500 youth clubs• Interactive website,

mobile phone activities, etc

3 core inquiries3 core inquiries

a. Understanding the creativity with which youth engage in media and communication environments

b. Attention to the socio-economic realities – a call for ethnographic immersion

c. Critical and social change/resistance perspective: exploring citizen tactics

Structural Determinants and Existential Structural Determinants and Existential ConditionsConditions

• The constraints of globalisation: from raised expectations to lives in ’nowherevilles’

• The state’s inability to ensure existential security (freedom of fear)

• Structural limitations -> Nowherelives?

Instable subjectivitiesInstable subjectivities

• Arjun Appadurai: mass migration and electronic mediation of everyday life =>

• ’a new order of instability in the production of modern subjectivity’

• Young boy in South Africa: ’your future gets stuck’

Human securityHuman security

• Human security as freedom from fear describes a condition of existence in which human dignity is realized, embracing not only physical safety but going beyond that to include meaningful participation in the life of the community, control over one’s life (…) while material sufficiency lies at the core of human security, in addition the concept encompasses non-material dimensions to form a qualitative whole. In other words, human security embraces the whole gamut of rights, civil and political, economic and social, and cultural (Thomas, 2007: 108-109)

Youth: New Social Agents living Youth: New Social Agents living Epochal ChangesEpochal Changes

• los jóvenes no son cualquier juventud, porque son los que están experimentando el cambio de época en su cuerpo. O sea, los mayores tenemos un tipo de dudas y de incertidumbres que no tiene nada que ver con la incertidumbre de nuestros hijos, son otras, es de otro calibre, es de otro tipo. Mira, cuando ellos nos preguntan por cuando fuimos jóvenes…!Oye! A nosotros, nosotros tuvimos utopías geniales, nosotros tuvimos seguridades, si? Tuvimos todos los dogmas que quisimos y ellos no tienen nada que se parezca a nada de eso, ni por el lado religioso, ni por el filosófico, ni por el lado político (Martin-Barbero 2010).

Research challenges Research challenges

• A ’glocal agenda’ – taking the changes at global level seriously into our research

• Youth participation in formulation of the agendas

Thank you.Thank you.

ttufte@ruc.dkttufte@ruc.dk