Call for Papers: Royal Geographical Society with IBG Annual Conference, London, 27-29 August 2014
Geographies of Youth Mobility
Convener: Laura Prazeres (Royal Holloway, University of London)
Discussant: Johanna Waters (University of Oxford)
Sponsored by the Population Geography Research Group and Geographies of Children, Youth and Families Research
Session abstract:
Young people make up the world’s most mobile group (UNDESA, 2011). Their movement across space is dynamic, contested, socially and politically charged and fraught with meaning, desires and challenges. Youth mobility has recently emerged at the fore of international attention. The forthcoming UN World Youth Report focuses on the theme of the 2013 International Youth Day (IYD) on ‘Youth Migration’. With the IYD celebrated annually on August 12th, this RGS session is particularly fitting and timely with the burgeoning interest in youth mobility. Buliung et al. (2012) have highlighted the need for geographers to engage with, and contribute to, research on youth mobility from diverse theoretical and methodological angles. Youth mobility is a highly relevant and vibrant area of research that stands to contribute to the discipline of geography as well as to wider interdisciplinary debates. This session seeks to gather a breadth of topics under the overarching theme of youth mobility. Aiming to build on existing and emerging scholarship, this session seeks to generate critical and innovative discussions and debates to guide future work. A broad definition of ‘youth’ is taken into consideration to encompass students, migrants, travellers, expatriates, global nomads, third culture kids (TCK) and others.
This session invites abstracts that deal with various facets and themes of youth mobility. These include (but not limited to):
– Educational travel
– International and intra-national student mobility
– Study and volunteer abroad
– Tourism and voluntourism
– Young backpackers and travellers
– Transnational perspectives
– Flows between the Global South and Global North
– Urban-rural youth migration
– Young expatriates
– Mobility and belonging
– Sense of place and ‘home’
– Journeys for self-discovery and personal development
– Global and national identities and citizenship
– Cosmopolitanism
– Motivations for mobility and migration
– Memory and affect
– Everyday life
– Transportation and commuting
– Mobile ethnography and methodologies
Please send abstracts of 250 words, including title, author names, affiliations, email addresses to Laura Prazeres Laura.Prazeres.2011@live.rhul.ac.uk by February 7th, 2014.
This session is expected to occupy two time slots with a format of 4 or 5 papers each.
References:
United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA) (2011) International Migration in a Globalizing World: The Role of Youth Technical Paper No. 2011/1). New York: UNDESA.
Buliung, R., Sultana, S., Faulkner, G. (2012) Guest editorial: special section on child and youth mobility – current research and nascent themes. Journal of Transport Geography 20, pp. 31–33.
Laura Prazeres 