The 11th Nordic Youth Research Conference (NYRIS11)
Global / Local Youth – New Civic Cultures, Rights and Responsibilities
Organized by the Finnish Youth Research Society
13–15 June 2011, University of Turku & Åbo Akademi University, Finland
The Finnish Youth Research Society is pleased to announce that the 11th NYRIS symposium Global / Local Youth – New Civic Cultures, Rights and Responsibilities will take place at the University of Turku and Åbo Akademi University, in Turku, Finland, 13–15 June 2011.
We now invite proposals for sessions to be held at the conference. Deadline for session submissions has been extended to August 31st, 2010.
NYRIS11 offers a platform for international, interdisciplinary and interactive discussion that will reflect the most exciting work in the wide field of youth studies.
Conference theme
NYRIS11 focuses on youth as a global and local construction. In the highly globalised and technologised world the concepts of local and global are increasingly inter-related. Young people make sense of their world in a context where local decisions have global consequences and the global issues influence the local. The global economical power structures are more and more decisive both in local decision making of child and youth politics and in the everyday lives of young people. Communities and cultures of young people are not solely connected to national political institutions and traditions. Youth cultures and lifestyles are lived in and created in local and global contexts. We need new concepts of citizenship and civic culture, which are sensitive to economic, social and individual dimensions as they are constructed locally and globally.
Youth research has seldom focused on youth as a global construction, or considered how the understanding of youth varies according to transnational localities. This concern can also be posed to youth research itself as a multidisciplinary field of research: how global is youth research theoretically, methodologically, epistemologically and ethically? How does youth research take into consideration the challenges posed by globalization on one hand and the increasingly fragmented and localized youth cultures on the other? NYRIS11 seeks to highlight the multiple tensions embedded in the contemporary understandings of childhood and youth by paying attention at questions, such as generational power relationships, age-related categorizations of youth and gendered power dynamics. Questions concerning in/equalities of young people between nations-states, new civic cultures and geopolitical contexts will also be on the focus.
Human rights provide an important context for global youth. The concept of rights can be seen as a tool for promoting equality, justice and well being of young people as citizens in the democratic decision making processes. However, at the same time the discourse of rights has implications and consequences that are seldom discussed. Whose rights and responsibilities do we mean, when we talk about the rights of children and young people in the globalizing world? How does the discourse of rights constitute young people as social, cultural, historical and moral agents? Or does the focus on rights rather construct young people as objects of policy interventions? Does the strengthening trend of young people’s rights (cultural, social, political, economic etc.) acknowledge generational and peer group relations and social inequalities? In NYRIS11 young people’s rights will be approached from a multidimensional viewpoint by welcoming discussion on the questions of recognition, responsibilities, agency and obligations among many other topics.
Practical information on the Call for Sessions
We warmly invite session proposals concerning:
1) Sessions open for individual paper presenters (the individual papers for these sessions will be sought with an open Call for Papers in fall 2010).
2) Complete sessions with a fixed collection of papers dealing with a given topic.
In addition to sessions presenting original research findings in the traditional form, we encourage proposals that offer innovative approaches to presenting and discussing scholarship. These may include for example discussions and roundtables, moderated debates, interactive workshops, as well as sessions featuring audio and visual resources.
We also encourage session coordinators to create diverse panels and to include papers that cross national and other categorical boundaries. Rather than a series of nation-based or regionally-specific conversations, we wish to create a space for truly comparative, cross-cultural exchange.
The proposals for sessions may be on any topic relevant to the conference theme. Proposals concerning following questions are especially welcome:
- Knowledge production and the politics of knowledge in youth studies
- Global and local inequality and human rights
- Economics, consumption and labor market
- Multiculturalism, immigration and ethnicity
- Global democracy, civic culture and participation of young people
- Child and youth protection in local and global contexts
- Violence, politics of fear
- Health and addictions
- Spatial, social, emotional and educational transitions
- Global and local youth cultures and lifestyles
- Virtuality, media and social media
- Gender, sexualities and embodiment
The coordinators are expected to act as chairs of the sessions they have proposed. All presenters, including the session coordinators are expected to register and pay to attend the conference in accordance with the general registration policy.
The language of the conference is English.
The length of the parallel session will be approx. 90–120 minutes. The suggested number of presenters in a session consisting of traditional workshop papers is 3−4 plus, the coordinator and discussant.
The session proposals, in one document attachment (in WORD or RTF format), should be submitted to the Organizing Committee by August 31st, 2010 to the address
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. The e-mail should have the subject heading “NYRIS 11 session proposal”.
The proposals should include the following information:
1. Title of the session
2. Coordinators of the session: Provide full name, affiliation, mailing address, telephone number and e-mail address of the coordinator(s) of the session. Coordinators will be responsible for selecting the papers for the session and they will act as chairs of the session at the conference.
3. Description of the topic of the session (not exceeding 300 words)
4. Participants of the session (optional): If the proposal concerns a complete session with given participants, the proposal should also include the individual abstracts of each participant and a list of names, affiliations, mailing addresses and e-mail of each participant.
5. Audio visual equipment and media requirements (data projector, DVD, internet, visual projection, audio and so on) required.
The Organizing Committee reserves the right to choose the final themes for the sessions. The Committee will review and choose sessions based on relevancy of the topic, originality, format and completeness of the proposal.
Please forward this Call for Sessions to colleagues and all others with an interest in the conference.
For more information about the conference see www.nyris11.com
