Building a Safe Context for Marginalized Youth

Dear Colleagues,

Through this Special Issue, we seek to critically interrogate the forces that produce and sustain marginalisation, foregrounding the lived experiences of young people whose voices are too often ignored or dismissed. We focus on the intersectional realities of marginalised youth and examine how overlapping inequalities such as poverty, race, gender, disability, geographical disadvantage, and systemic injustice have compounded disadvantages and restricted life chances, particularly in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic.

In recent years, long-standing social and economic pressures have not only converged but intensified, creating new layers of vulnerability for young people. The result is a landscape marked by deepening marginalisation, rising distrust and distress, and increasing polarisation. This shapes and reinforces the structural barriers young people encounter in their everyday lives. Our intention is not only to analyse these dynamics but to challenge the structures that normalise inequality and marginalisation, and to assert the rights, dignity, and agency of young people who continue to be pushed to the edges of social, political, and economic life.

We think many academics, policy makers, students, and practitioners will recognise the challenge facing today’s young people, particularly for those for whom their education journey was impacted by lockdown. This journal seeks to explore the impact of this, and other factors, in the hope that we can find positive messages which show young people thriving once more. Contributions will be invited that cover (but are not limited to) one or more of the following themes:

• Cultural difference, gender, race, class;
• The ‘Lost Generation’;
• Young carers and care leavers;
• Contemporary social issues, e.g., homelessness;
• Marginalised/disaffected young people and social movements, e.g., Black Lives Matter;
• Far right movements, protest, and populism;
• Young people in conflict zones;
• Mental health and wellbeing;
• Social media and digital cultures;
• Autism and neurodivergence/neurotypicality;
• LGBTQ+;
• Disability;
• Transgender experiences;
• Gender and identity;
• Creative and contemporary practices that support young people.

We are looking to bring together a series of cutting-edge articles that celebrate the distinctive contribution of those researching and working with marginalised young people. We hope to explore the diverse lives (and challenges) faced by young people and emergent and contemporary practice responses. With a social justice orientation, this Special Issue will be relevant to policy makers, academics, and those teaching and learning across youth and community work/social science programmes, creating alternative pedagogies of hope.

Dr. Jean Harris-Evans
Prof. Alan Smith
Christine Smith
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Social Sciences is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1800 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• young people/youth
• marginalisation
• post-COVID
• informal education
• pedagogies of hope
• youth work
• intersectionality