Document Type
Article
Rights
Available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Share Alike 4.0 International Licence
Disciplines
Social sciences
Abstract
In this paper, we explore the experiences of Irish and Zimbabwean youth who live and work in precarious economic conditions. We study these youths’ experiences in a manner that traverses contexts under the question: How do un(der)employed youth in the Global South and Global North enact resilience and agency while navigating economic precarity? The paper builds on youth literature from both the Global North and Global South, emphasizing socio-economic precarity, youth agency, and resilience. We collected our data from interviews conducted in Ireland and Zimbabwe. Methodologically, the paper follows a postcolonial narrative approach to study these experiences. Our findings show that, in the 21st Century, youth in Ireland (from the Global North) and Zimbabwe (from the Global South) have distinct lived experiences of economic precarity. Our findings also show that when applying a postcolonial gaze, these youths’ experiences are not as clear-cut or distinct as the literature suggests. We conclude warning against unrealistic (neo)colonial comparisons between youth from Global North and South, which create stereotyped assumptions that (mis)inform policy and support interventions created in response to perceived challenges.
DOI
http://dx.doi.org/10.5027/psicoperspectivas
Recommended Citation
Weston, Alia et al. (2019) Un(der)employed youth: fom precariousness to resilience. Psicoperspectivas [online], vol.18(3),pp.29-40. doi:10.5027/psicoperspectivas-vol18-issue3-fulltext-1671.
Publication Details
Psicoperspectivas, volume 18, issue 3