Shakuntala Banaji

The trouble with civic: a snapshot of young people's civic and political engagements in twenty-first-century democracies

In much academic and policy literature about civic engagement, regardless of their political or social circumstances, youth across the globe are enjoined to engage in all the activities thought good for them in order to qualify for the moral label ‘good citizens’. Voting, watching the news, party activism, sending emails to government websites, attending meetings in the town hall, volunteering, or addressing envelopes for civic organisations are examples of the kinds of activities most often highlighted. In this discourse, distrust and dissatisfaction, however legitimate, as well as group anger, cynicism and unsanctioned protest, are seen as being in conflict with proper ‘civic pathways’. The ‘political’ is primarily configured as pertaining to elections and government, and civic is the implicitly pro-social and conformist field within which future citizens are educated for political engagement. By the same token, when it is not straightforwardly about a ‘passport’ which represents a set of rights and duties, citizenship appears to become a kind of etiquette, whereby ‘members’ communicate with their ‘elected representatives’ and regardless of the outcome of their interest and action, continue to be motivated and interested in the actions of ‘their’ government. But how do such academic and policy conceptualisations of ‘the good citizen’ and ‘civic action’ map onto the real lives of young people? Based on a case study of responses to young peoples activism following the start of the 2003 war in Iraq, as well as on the initial findings of the European project about young people, civic participation and the internet, Civicweb, running from 2006 to 2009, this paper engages speculatively with questions such as the following. What kinds of political actions are in fact being encouraged by those who complain that youth are in deficit when it comes to the political and civic realm and, in contrast, what are young people doing in this realm? Is all ‘civic action’ necessarily benign and desirable, or is it merely constructed in this normative manner rhetorically, in order to emphasise an ideal or pro-social version of democratic citizenship? And, more controversially, could apathy, a refusal to vote, civil disobedience, and/or mass resistance to government policies be more democratic alternatives than state-sanctioned or authoritarian ‘civic’ action?

THE CIVIC SELL: Young people, the internet, and ethical consumption

This article is based on newly completed research looking at the role of the internet as a means of promoting civic engagement and participation among young people aged 15–25. It focuses on one specific aspect of this phenomenon, namely the use of websites to promote ‘ethical consumption’ among young people. This paper begins by briefly examining several intersecting works discussing not-for-profit marketing, commercial marketing, youth cultures and subcultures, politics, and ethical consumerism. It then moves on to examine the rhetorical constructions of youth identity and ethical consumerism on a range of civic websites, exploring the identifications and disavowals implicit in the language, layout, and imagery, and the conceptualizations civic-orientated Web producers have of their audiences and of consumption per se. This is achieved by taking a case-study approach involving a qualitative textual analysis of web-pages taken from UK and US-based sites such as Adbusters, Oxfams Generation Why, Ethics Girls, Adili and Amnesty International, which advertise or promote the buying of ethical goods by young people. It also involves an analysis of the aims of the site producers, as exemplified on the sites’ mission statements and in in-depth interviews. By means of this analysis, the article seeks to identify and assess the actually or potentially ‘civic’ aspects of these sites and to question the notion of ethical consumption in particular.

Loving with irony: young Bombay viewers discuss clothing, sex and their encounters with media

The media landscape in urban India has changed so rapidly in the past 10 years that it is not easy to consider the ways in which these changes interact with peoples lives and beliefs. Apocalyptic pronouncements about the ways in which MTV‐style television, films and the Internet are destroying ‘genuine’ Indian culture by promoting western sexual values abound in journalistic and political circles. But what are the realities of young peoples encounters with media in a thriving Indian metropolis? How do they make sense of all the vastly different images of sexuality embodied in community/religious edicts and modern media? And how are their interpretations of all these supposed ‘messages’ played out in their everyday lives? Emerging from a three‐year study of youth audiences of Hindi films in London and Bombay, this article explores the ways in which young peoples sexual attitudes, values and behaviours are inflected by encounters with films, television and the Internet. By focusing on understandings of sex and love within the context of statements about community norms, sex education and personal sexual practices, this article also engages with ideas and myths about representations of women that have dominated recent debates on sex, censorship and the media in India.

‘Neutrality Comes From Inside Us’: British-Asian and Indian Perspectives on Television News after 11 September

This paper focuses on responses to the viewing of television news channels during and after 11 September 2001 by a sample of Indian viewers in Bombay and British-Asian viewers in South-East England. Viewers’ perceptions of neutrality, bias, reliability and vested interests within news channels and organisations are discussed, alongside the manner in which issues of gender, age and religion impact on the meanings made from and imputed to the news coverage of the attacks on America and Afghanistan. As well as considering the ways in which multilingual and sometimes transnational families experience television news in the contemporary arena, the paper addresses questions about the political significance and social impact of news broadcasts within communities with pre-existing beliefs and world views. We argue that the ways in which many so-called ‘international’ news channels covered issues of blame, evidence and retribution with regard to the Twin Tower and Pentagon attacks raised levels of tension, increased communal dislikes and reinforced pre-existing animosities against Muslim communities across the world.

Behind the high-tech fetish: children, work and media use across classes in India

A dearth of media might seem idyllic to urban parents tired of being pestered for an iPad or the latest game. But given the increasing focus amongst Western scholars and educators on theorising digital media as a conduit to conviviality, creativity and civic participation, insights can be gained from the lives and narratives of media-rich and media-deprived children in areas of the global south. Using original observations and in-depth qualitative interviews with rural and urban Indian children aged 9–17, this article discusses the media, work, learning and anxieties they face in everyday life. These data are analysed drawing on frameworks developed to understand child work and children’s agency in the fields of critical sociology and social anthropology. Findings suggest the need for a revised analysis of media use and cultural meaning in middle and low income contexts as strongly inflected by children’s social class, their responsibilities, labour, contextual knowledge and embeddedness in diverse non-mediated communities.

What’s stopping us? Barriers to creativity and innovation in schooling across Europe

This comprehensive yet concise Handbook provides an overview of innovative approaches to, and new perspectives on, the study of creativity. In this timely work, creativity is not defined by an ideal, rather it encompasses a range of theories, functions, characteristics, processes, products and practices that are associated with the generation of novel and useful outcomes suited to particular social, cultural and political contexts. Chapters present original research by international scholars from a wide range of disciplines including history, sociology, psychology, philosophy, cultural studies, education, economics and interdisciplinary studies. Their research investigates creativity in diverse fields including art, creative industries, aesthetics, design, new media, music, arts education, science, engineering and technology. Containing cutting-edge research the Handbook of Research on Creativity will strongly appeal to academics and advanced students in cultural studies, creative industries, art history and theory, experimental music and performance studies, digital and new media studies, engineering, economics, sociology, psychology and social psychology, management studies, and education – particularly visual arts education and music education. Policy makers, managers and entrepreneurs will also find much to interest them in this fascinating work.

Apathy or alienation? Political passivity among youths across eight European Union countries

Abstract Political participation is one of the most studied aspects of the contemporary development of western democracies. A recent trend focuses the lack of political participation among younger generations. At the same time, the last decades have also witnessed a growth in the share of young European Union (EU) citizens who express alienation, and distrust toward social and political institutions at the national as well as the European level. By studying young people across different countries of the EU, the current study aims to examine if youths’ political passivity is better explained by political apathy or alienation. Our analyses are based on a comparative survey data collected by the Catch-EyoU project comprising approximately 4 454 late adolescents assembled from eight member countries of the EU. Results from logistic regressions predicting non-voting from apathy and alienation support the idea that political passivity is best understood as the result of political apathy. Moreover, it seems that the underlying separator of apathetic and alienated youths is cognitive awareness of political life. These results are discussed in relation to potentially built-in paradoxes of apathy present in efficient and well-functional welfare-state democracies.

Framing young citizens: explicit invitation and implicit exclusion on youth civic websites

Abstract This paper takes as its focus discourses about young people, intercultural citizenship, voice and participation on a range of youth civic websites surveyed during the project CivicWeb. This was a 3-year, seven-country European Commission funded study of young people, the Internet and civic participation. Specifically, it calls upon evidence from qualitative case studies of three contemporary civic websites in Britain, the UK Youth Parliament, European Youth Portal and MuslimYouth.Net, including textual analysis as well as interviews with key producers and young users of these and other civic sites. In light of current debates around the best means of engaging young people in civic activities on- and offline, the paper seeks to answer questions about the potential benefits and dangers of producers’ pedagogic styles, ideological perspectives and normative choices in relation to young peoples civic motivation and efficacy. Finally the paper looks at the match or disjuncture between the sites’ missions for youth citizenship and the actual young people who respond to the sites’ address and ethos and asks how more civic producers can move towards a situated, motivating and inclusive model of communication on- and offline.

Private Lives and Public Spaces: The Precarious Pleasures of Gender Discourse in Raja Hindustani

Banaji provides an analysis of Dharmesh Darshans 1996 commercial Hindi film hit, Raja Hindustani, at three levels. First, she assesses the film from the point of view of a spectator and asks which elements of the film or strategies on the part of its director might account for the pleasures provided. In the process, the films overt and covert constructions/assumptions of supposedly Indian forms of gender behaviour are identified. Second, she discusses Raja Hindustani as a semiotic text, whose subtle and often contradictory audio-visual clues attempt to structure the audiences perceptions. During this discussion, aspects of the pleasure on offer in the film are juxtaposed with possible meanings accruing from particular scenes to suggest the complexity of interpretation required when making assertions about a films ideological positioning. Banaji finally explores the ways in which what could be termed‘moral messages’ or discourses of gender and sexuality, which permeate the film at a broader narrative level, seem to be understood by young viewers. Transcripts from in-depth as well as brief interviews with young filmgoers are used throughout to reveal and complicate assumptions about the impact or effect such films might have on gender behaviour. In addition, an attempt is made to contextualize both film sequences and youth responses to them via a brief discussion of current sociopolitical debates and practices in India.

CATCH-EyoU Work Package 2 Dataset 2.1a - Full Consortium Collection of Literature. Derived Dataset

The dataset contains a textual corpus of references in academic literature concerning Europe, youth engagement and active citizenship. The references were searched, catalogued and summarized by CATCH-EyoU researchers in the fields of Cultural Studies, Education, History, Media and Communication, Philosophy, Political Science, Psychology and Sociology. The analyzed literature consists of 779 selected texts. The dataset represents an integration of the CATCH-EyoU Work Package 2 Dataset 2.1a: Full Consortium Collection of Literature Matrix available at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.1313202. It relies on the following information: specific identifying information about the text itself (title/author/year/publisher); and abstract or summarizing information either taken directly from the text or summarized by the researcher. With respect to the CATCH-EyoU Work Package 2 Dataset 2.1a: Full Consortium Collection of Literature Matrix, the current dataset adds further information relative to each record, namely: identification number for each record; leading disciplinary field according to which the text was searched by the researchers. These integrations were used in specific lexicometric content analysis and the dataset allows its replication or further textual analyses.