Youth Activist Perspectives on Intergenerational Dynamics and Adult Solidarity in Youth Movements

• In Event: Webbing Together Social Justice in and Outside the Classroom

Abstract

This study aims to surface youth perspectives on their own activism, their experiences of age-based power dynamics in activist spaces, and their understandings of adult solidarity. Using interviews and participatory visual methods that invite youth to create original memes, we explore these questions with ten youth activists involved in counterhegemonic organizing movements in the United States. Our analysis reveals that youth activists feel fundamentally misunderstood along multiple dimensions, including the practice of activism in online and offline spaces, the meaning of their participation in activism, and their desires in terms of intergenerational solidarity. This research contributes to a bottom-up understanding of youth activist praxis in relation to larger cultural discourses and adultist systems, while identifying practical implications for intergenerational support.

Authors

• AL Liou, Teachers College, Columbia University

• Ioana Literat, Teachers College, Columbia University