“Families should stay together”: intergenerational attitudes among South African youth
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.21504/sajg.v3i2.47Abstract
In this article we contest the widespread view that the social or political consciousness that developed among South African youth, as a result of their role in the uprisings of the 1980s, led them to reject the authority of the older generation, in their families and generally. Using the results of a national probability-sample survey among youth of the four main race groups in South Africa, we argue that an assumed political consciousness is not a helpful variable to use in understanding South African youth and their attitudes towards the values of their parents. We go on to disaggregate “youth” according to parental presence and roles during childhood; to find various and changing patterns of parenting, including the importance of grandmothers; and to argue that intergenerational attitudes among young people differ importantly according to these differing formative experiences.References
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Budlender, D. 1994b. Youth employment schemes: reviewing international experience. In: Everatt. D. (Ed.) Creating a future: youth policy for South Africa. Johannesburg: Ravan Press. pp. 97- 132.
Burman, S. & Fuchs, R. 1986. When families split: custody on divorce in South Africa. In: Burman. S. & Reynolds. P. (Eds) Growing up in a divided society: the contexts of childhood in South Africa. Johannesburg: Ravan Press, pp. 115-38.
Cock, J., Emdon, E. & Klugman, B. 1986. The care of the apartheid child: an urban African study. In: Burman, S. & Reynolds. P. (Eds) Growing up in a divided society: the contexts of childhood in South Africa. Johannesburg: Ravan Press, pp. 66-92.
Everatt, D. (Ed.) 1994. Creating a future: youth policy for South Africa. Johannesburg: Ravan Press.
Everatt, D. & Milner, S. 1994. Youth. AIDS and the future. In: Everan, D. (Ed.) Creating a future: youth policy for South Africa. Johannesburg: Ravan Press, pp. 6-35.
Everatt, D. & Sisulu, E. (Eds) 1992. Black youth in crisis: facing the future. Johannesburg: Ravan Press.
Everatt, D. & Orkin, M. 1993. Growing up tough: a national survey of South African youth. In: Community Agency for Social Enquiry (CASE) Report, submitted to Second National Conference on Marginalised Youth, Broederstroom.
Gevisser, M. 1994. Youth in Africa: an integrated approach. In: Everatt, D. (Ed.) Creating a future: youth policy for South Africa. Johannesburg: Ravan Press, pp. 133· 75.
Hirschowitz, R, Milner, S. & Everatt. D. 1994. Growing up in a violent society. In: Everatt, D. (Ed.) Creating a future: youth policy for South Africa. Johannesburg: Ravan Press, pp. 67-96.
Jones, S. 1992. Children on the move: parenting, mobility and birth-status among migrants. In: Burman, S. & Preston-Whyte. E. (Eds) Questionable issue: illegitimacy in South Africa. Cape Town: Oxford University Press, pp. 247-81.
Ramphele, M. 1992. Social disintegration in the black community: implications for social transformation. In: Everatt, D. & Sisulu, E. (Eds) Black youth in crisis: facing the future. Johannesburg: Ravan Press. pp. 10-29.
Seekings, J. 1993. Heroes or villains? Youth politics in the 1980s. Johannesburg: Ravan Press.
Simkins, C. 1986. Household composition and structure in South Africa. In: Burman. S. & Reynolds, P. (Eds) Growing up in a divided society: the contexts of childhood in South Africa. Johannesburg: Ravan Press, pp. 16-42.
South African Institute of Race Relations. 1987. Race Relations Survey 1986. Part 1. Johannesburg: South African Institute of Race Relations.
Straker, G. 1992. Faces in the revolution: the psychological effects of violence on township youth in South Africa. Cape Town: David Philip.
Truscott, K. & Milner, S. 1994. Youth, education and the world of work. In: Everatt, D. (Ed.) Creating a future: youth policy for South Africa. Johannesburg: Ravan Press, pp. 36-66.
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1994-10-01
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