Traditions and transitions: teenagers' perceptions of parading in Belfast

The purpose of this article is to explore and illuminate teenagers' experiences of, and attitudes to, parades in Belfast. The research draws on responses from 125 teenagers located in interface areas (areas where Catholics and Protestants live side by side but apart) to government supported attempts to rebrand Orangefest (traditional parade associated with Protestant/Unionist/Loyalist community) and St Patrick's Day (traditional parade associated with Catholic/Nationalist/Republican community) as all-inclusive community events. For the most part, young people access these parades in pre-existing, single identity peer groups and view these parades as either inclusive or exclusive calling into question the extent to which Belfast's city centre can be viewed as shared space.     

‘Chilling’ and ‘hopping’ in the ‘teenage space network’: explorations in teenagers’ geographies in the city of Mechelen

Within the field of children's geographies several calls have been made to develop ‘teenagers’ geographies’ as a complementary field of research and practice. It has been stated that teenagers remain ‘invisible’ or ‘marginalised’ in public debates as well as in research and practice, even within childhood studies and children's geographies. Further explorations in teenagers’ geographies could contribute to the research on ‘diverse childhoods’. This article explores the spatial worlds of teenagers (approximately 12–16 years) in Flanders (Belgium), a region characterised by a dense network of smaller cities and ‘urban sprawl’. Based on street interviews and observations in a small city several mental maps and patterns of teenagers’ use of public space were identified. Starting from a case study in the city of Mechelen, this article suggests how these perspectives can be integrated into urban planning by identifying and tying together relevant planning layers, thus creating a more closely knit ‘teenage space network’. Wouter Vanderstede is an urban planner, anthropologist and historian. He is a researcher and staff member at Childhood & Society Research Centre–Onderzoekscentrum Kind & Samenleving vzw. Child friendly and teenager friendly planning and design of public space is one of the main research themes of the institute. View all notes     

Family caregiving for older adults: gendered roles and caregiver burden in emigrant households of Kerala,India

The Indian state of Kerala leads the demographic transition and characteristically showcases emigration of predominantly male adult children, leaving behind parents, spouses and children. When men emigrate, gendered contexts burden women, especially spouses and daughters-in-law, with caregiving duties including elder care. Employing the social exchange perspective and drawing on in-depth interviews of left-behind caregivers to older adults in emigrant households, we explore reciprocal motives, expectations and perceptions of burden. Findings resonate gendered expectations of care and social sanction that ensure women do much of the caregiving. Daughters-in-law sacrificed careers and endured separation from husbands to transition into caregiving roles, costs borne to effectuate their husband's filial role. Perceived non-reciprocity, unbalanced exchanges and unmet expectations increased perceptions of burden for caregivers. Temporary financial autonomy could hardly alleviate perceptions of burden among women caregivers who perceived emotional and functional support exchanges from husbands, older adults themselves or other family members as supportive.     

三江源生态移民社会适应与回迁愿望分析

本文通过对三江源生态移民社会适应和回迁愿望的研究,针对三江源生态移民社会适应程度不高、回迁愿望不高这一悖论,分析了形成原因,提出了提高移民社会适应程度、降低回迁风险的对策。     

承传与创新:略谈四邑侨乡与北美洲华人社区的通俗文化

论文将北美华人社区与广东珠三角侨乡在地方语言和通俗文化的传承与演变方面进行了比较研究。认为二者之间的跨越太平洋文化关系密切。广府的通俗文化一直是北美华人社区的主流文化;北美华人的生活文化意识也是珠三角侨乡的地方文化特色。两者互相影响,互动演变。不过,在20世纪50年代以后,这个互动的承传创新的关系出现了分化和演变。北美华人社区因为有大量新移民持续涌入而不断发展,而珠三角侨乡地区的侨乡文化形态,则逐渐失去了昔日的光芒需要转型,比如依赖过去的移民历史文化遗产来开发旅游经济。     

Book reviews

Mobile phones have invited a number of dystopian understandings, particularly as far as young people are concerned. They have been variously argued to contribute to poor spelling and grammar, disturb attention to school work, facilitate text bullying, lead to brain cancers and promote the destruction of face-to-face relationships. Despite these concerns, text messaging is by far the most common form of mobile communication between young people in New Zealand. Drawing on actor-network theory and qualitative research conducted with New Zealand teenagers, we explore how teenagers, cell phones, socio-spatial relations and discourses exist within a hybrid and interdependent network which we have termed digital sociality. This network seems to facilitate rather than destroy proximal contact. The machine and the human, in a cyborgian sense, meld to develop new and complex workings of space and the social which suggests mobile technologies are not as damaging to young people as many have suggested and calls for preventative approaches to this technology might need therefore to be rethought.     

Leisure time preferences and health-risk behavior of teenagers in the post-communist Central European countries

In Central and Eastern Europe (CE), alcohol consumption, smoking, and substance use have become a substantial problem mainly among young people as well as changes of their leisure time occupations. The paper uses the binary logistic regression to measure the association between a certain type of leisure occupations and health-risk behaviors to show which activities are the most prone to health-risk behaviors. The analysis shows one prominent result – the strong relation between health-risk behavior of teenagers and going out in the evenings in the CE countries. There are, however, some specific protective factors of teenage risk behavior; these could be used to focus anti-risk behavior campaigns aimed at teenagers.     

Gender differences in teenage alcohol consumption and spatial practices

In recent years teenagers have reported a decline in under-age drinking at the same time as their access to public space has been increasingly curtailed. In this paper we explore the spatial practices and drinking behaviours of a group of teenage girls and boys aged 13–14 years in Liverpool, UK. Our analysis considers how their use of space was bound up with experimentation with alcohol and how this varied by gender. We find in support of previous research that both boys and girls report nuanced experiences of public space, with some enjoying greater freedom while others have moved into more domestic and supervised leisure spaces in response to fears about their safety in public spaces. The boys also reported less alcohol consumption than the girls. These gendered experiences were mediated by social relationships and encounters with other young people, their parents and carers and also other adults in positions of authority.     

印尼华裔青少年语言与认同的个案分析--华侨大学华文学院印尼华裔学生的调查研究

本文依据对华侨大学华文学院印尼华裔学生的调查研究,探讨印尼华裔青少年一代的语言环境、语言使用、语言能力及其认同问题.调查表明,印尼华裔学生是以印尼语为主、具有双语或多语能力的语言使用者;虽经数十年的严厉禁止,但他们在印尼现仍有一个使用汉语言文字的环境;他们程度不一地具有汉语方言的能力;他们学习汉语的目的动机与华人身份的认同紧密联系在一起.     

Situating (Young) teenagers in geographies of children and youth

The past decade has been an exciting and productive period in the study of children's and young people's geographies. The principal aim of this paper is to contribute to this field of research by presenting the arguments for a more substantive focus on teenagers' geographies. Firstly, the terms ‘children’ and ‘young people’ are constructed as synonymous and used interchangeably and the complex transitional positioning of young teenagers—situated between childhood, youth and adulthood—has been relatively neglected. Secondly, many researchers have been engaged in developing methods, which aim to challenge unequal power relations between adult researchers and young participants but little focus has been placed on utilizing participants' own constructions of themselves. The final argument for a more coherent focus on teenagers' geographies rests on the contribution that geographers can make to challenging negative stereotypes of teenagers within policy and the media. The paper concludes by outlining what form an emphasis on teenagers' geographies may take.