Brussels youth: between diversity and adversity

Brussels is a city which is highly segmented on both the social as the cultural level. This diversity is also reflected among the youth. In this article we present the results of a survey undertaken among the last year students of the francophone schools of the city of Brussels. The survey, which fo...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Dirk Jacobs, Andrea Rea
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Université libre de Bruxelles - ULB 2007-09-01
Series:Brussels Studies
Subjects:
Online Access:http://journals.openedition.org/brussels/437
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1850055587984834560
author Dirk Jacobs
Andrea Rea
author_facet Dirk Jacobs
Andrea Rea
author_sort Dirk Jacobs
collection DOAJ
description Brussels is a city which is highly segmented on both the social as the cultural level. This diversity is also reflected among the youth. In this article we present the results of a survey undertaken among the last year students of the francophone schools of the city of Brussels. The survey, which focusses on life styles, racism and insecurity, confirms the multifaceted character of the Brussels youth. Important sources of diversity and division are social background, ethnic origin and school choice. Our findings attest that the relations amongst young people are built on identities that are rooted in references to socio-economic class and ethnic origin, while their intensity varies with the type of education. The ethnicisation of the young people’s social relations seems to be very widespread. The survey attests to a paradox: racist insults are quite common, and are not only oriented towards ethnic minorities, but at the same time almost everyone supports the dominant antiracist discourse.
format Article
id doaj-art-7ee19fc5d064435eaa2e5e454e4b14df
institution DOAJ
issn 2031-0293
language English
publishDate 2007-09-01
publisher Université libre de Bruxelles - ULB
record_format Article
series Brussels Studies
spelling doaj-art-7ee19fc5d064435eaa2e5e454e4b14df2025-08-20T02:51:56ZengUniversité libre de Bruxelles - ULBBrussels Studies2031-02932007-09-0110.4000/brussels.437Brussels youth: between diversity and adversityDirk JacobsAndrea ReaBrussels is a city which is highly segmented on both the social as the cultural level. This diversity is also reflected among the youth. In this article we present the results of a survey undertaken among the last year students of the francophone schools of the city of Brussels. The survey, which focusses on life styles, racism and insecurity, confirms the multifaceted character of the Brussels youth. Important sources of diversity and division are social background, ethnic origin and school choice. Our findings attest that the relations amongst young people are built on identities that are rooted in references to socio-economic class and ethnic origin, while their intensity varies with the type of education. The ethnicisation of the young people’s social relations seems to be very widespread. The survey attests to a paradox: racist insults are quite common, and are not only oriented towards ethnic minorities, but at the same time almost everyone supports the dominant antiracist discourse.http://journals.openedition.org/brussels/437immigrationyouthracismdiscrimination
spellingShingle Dirk Jacobs
Andrea Rea
Brussels youth: between diversity and adversity
Brussels Studies
immigration
youth
racism
discrimination
title Brussels youth: between diversity and adversity
title_full Brussels youth: between diversity and adversity
title_fullStr Brussels youth: between diversity and adversity
title_full_unstemmed Brussels youth: between diversity and adversity
title_short Brussels youth: between diversity and adversity
title_sort brussels youth between diversity and adversity
topic immigration
youth
racism
discrimination
url http://journals.openedition.org/brussels/437
work_keys_str_mv AT dirkjacobs brusselsyouthbetweendiversityandadversity
AT andrearea brusselsyouthbetweendiversityandadversity