As psycho-sociologists intervening daily in the public space of low-income housing projects, we aim in this article to explore the diverse modes of socialization of youths living in these housing projects, and to retrace the major lines of historical evolution of groups of “ youths from the projects ”, often inscribed today in processes of marginalization. We emphasize the reinforcement of power struggles between institutions and illegal economic organizations within the public space of low-income housing, and the instrumental violence committed against adolescents.
On the basis of these analyses, we suggest the construction of a position inside in the housing project for educators and psychologists so that they may function as third party and social bond.
Archives par mot-clé : Educators
Dominique Dray : adolescence : world shock at the crossroads of culture
Group homes that receive adolescents from urban housing projects are here envisaged as places of contact between two cultures – the shock of two cultures. Educators must create structural liaisons between the world of adolescents and that of discipline, to work to transform the shock into a cultural crossroads. This implies a rearrangement of the institutional setting.
The placement of a youth in a group home is here envisaged as a situation similar to migration. Without negating the relevance of the usual interpretation of transgressive adolescent behavior as symptomatic, a different, and complementary reading is offered here. These behaviors are a attempt by adolescents to maintain their inscription in the world they come from, and more generally, to deal with a conflict of norms.
The example of a runaway illustrates this argument.