Premium
Disappearing youth: Youth as a social shifter in Botswana
Author(s) -
Durham Deborah
Publication year - 2004
Publication title -
american ethnologist
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.875
H-Index - 78
eISSN - 1548-1425
pISSN - 0094-0496
DOI - 10.1525/ae.2004.31.4.589
Subject(s) - invocation , autonomy , agency (philosophy) , power (physics) , sociology , youth studies , index (typography) , positive youth development , gender studies , political science , social science , law , anthropology , world wide web , computer science , physics , quantum mechanics
ABSTRACT In this article, I explore the discourses of youth in Botswana, focusing the analysis on 1995 protests over the murder of a student. I argue that youth should be examined as a social shifter: When invoked, youth indexes sets of social relationships that are dynamic and constructed in the invocation. As people argue over who youth are and how they behave, they index shifting relationships of power and authority, responsibility and capability, agency and autonomy, and the moral configurations of society.