Conference Call:
Retrenching/Entrenching Youth: Mobility and Stasis in Youth Culture Representations on Screen
University of Liverpool
4th - 5th June 2018
Confirmed Keynotes:
Professor Pamela Robertson Wojcik, University of Notre Dame
Dr. Timothy Shary, Southern New Hampshire University
Professor Karen Lury, University of Glasgow
In recent years the expansion of free trade, globalization and freedom of movement, has facilitated the emergence of immigrant youths who view themselves as transnational citizens (Maira 2004).
Often travelling as tourists, migrant workers or students, these young people seek to live in different countries, experience new cultures, see new places, form new communities and/or find adventure. This freedom of movement has been reflected in young people’s
films such as Love, Rosie; The Dreamers; An Education; What If; The Fault in Our Stars; Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants; The Inbetweeners Movie; Call Me By Your Name; Copenhagen; Bekas; Una Noche; Twilight: New Moon; Pitch Perfect 2; Pitch
Perfect 3; Everything is Illuminated and Eurotrip; in television programmes such as
Gossip Girl (season 4); Gilmore Girls (season 5);One Tree Hill (season 9);
Degrassi: The Next Generation (Season 8) and Skins (season 2); as well as in Netflix series like
Gilmore Girls (“A Year in the Life”).
The flow of media, goods and people across national borders and the formation of online communities have seen youth culture embedded within both national and global trends and happenings. Yet,
As Stephen Castles, Hein de Haas, and Mark Miller note, “the growth of transnational society has given rise to novel challenges” (17). The strain of these challenges has been seen in both the Brexit and Trump campaigns and surprised victories, with immigration
and tighter border control serving as a central issue in both campaigns. While in the British referendum and the American presidential election young people more commonly voted to remain in the European Union and against Trump and his values, this generation
now faces tightening borders and heightened nationalism. In this conference, we aim to explore how contemporary youth culture has been shaped by these and other earlier developments such as, the global financial crisis, the increased visibility of terrorism
in the West, and the intersecting ways in which industrial, economic, social, cultural and political factors have affected the representation of young people’s stasis and mobility on screen. Papers, panels and workshops are invited on but not limited to:
~ Youth Culture and (Trans)National Identity
~ Beyond Borders: Youth Culture and Online Communities
~ Travel in Contemporary Youth Film and Television
~ Youth Culture and the Media
~ Youth Literature and Travel
~ Group Commitment and Boundaries among Young People
~ The Changing Landscape of Borders and Youth Culture
~ Youth Culture and Brexit
~ Youth Culture and Trump
~ Youth Culture in the European Union
Please send queries and abstracts of 250-350 words, along with a brief bio of no more than 100 words, to
[log in to unmask] by
18th March 2018. The conference chairs are Dr. Yannis Tzioumakis & Dr. Katherine Whitehurst at the University of Liverpool. Conference details can be obtained at:
https://commsmedialiverpool.wordpress.com