Metropolitics

Geolocation Among Teenage Peers: Between Play, Control, and Gendered Vulnerability

Yann Bruna & translated by Oliver Waine — 2025-03-28T06:00:00Z

Geolocation practices among teenagers are ambivalent, combining aspects of both play and surveillance. Yann Bruna examines Snap Map use, which exposes girls in particular to new forms of vulnerability online and in urban spaces.
Whether used in the workplace, within families or in romantic relationships, geolocation tracking has become an increasingly popular way of monitoring the activities of others over the last 10 years, propelled in particular by the widespread use of smartphones—the

- From the Field / teenagers, geolocation, youth, communication technology, surveillance, technology

The Boys of Sarajevo's War Tunnel

Luka Lucić — 2016-01-12T06:00:00Z

What are the impacts of war upon young people's psychological development? Research with young men who survived Sarajevo's siege sheds new light on how young people draw upon their social and spatial environment to make sense of violent experiences.
“… The next moment I was walking in a narrow passage reeking of urine and sweat. The tunnel was about five feet high, so I had to hunch down or I would hit my head. Dirt and water dripped on us, and we slogged through ankle-deep mud. I was

- From the Field / conflict, adolescents, development, teenagers, youth, affordances, war, siege, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina

The Future of Asbury Park: Gentrification and Youth in a Coastal Community

Alicia Raia-Hawrylak — 2015-03-31T04:55:00Z

Once known as a successful beach community, with a lively boardwalk and thriving rock music scene, the city of Asbury Park, New Jersey, faced steep decline as investment shifted to the suburbs and other places of amusement. With gentrification occurring since the early 2000s, Alicia Raia-Hawrylak documents the experience of an oft-neglected group in both academic research and urban politics, the city's youth, and considers their inclusion in future urban planning.
Asbury Park, New Jersey is a

- From the Field / gentrification, United States, children, teenagers, tourism, youth, community

Teenage mobility: a socialised and socialising practice

Julian Devaux & Nicolas Oppenchaim & translated by Oliver Waine — 2013-03-27T05:55:00Z

The comings and goings of teenagers, while a frequent source of tension in the parent–child relationship, are a crucial experience in the construction of social identities. For this age group, mobility is not just a practice that is socially determined – by social background, residential environment and schooling – but also a specific experience that durably shapes their relationships with the spaces and the social world they encounter.
---- Series: Children in the City Adolescence is a

- Essays / ZUS, public space, Paris region, rural, mobility, transport, children, teenagers, youth