The Institute for Gender and Development Studies (IGDS) presents "Graduate Studies Guest Seminar" on "Making Meaning of the Violence in their Communities: The Case of Jamaican Youth."
This guest seminar is presented by Carl James, Professor in Education and Sociology and Andrea Davis, Associate Professor in Gender, Feminist and Women’s Studies, York University.
This event takes place this Friday November 28 at 5pm in the IGDS Seminar Room.
A special invitation is extended to NGO’s and CSO’s engaged in work on violence within communities.
This presentation is about using data collected through a cross-national research conducted in Jamaica over the past three years, the presentation provides insight into how young men and women living in Kingston and in a rural community in St. Mary, Jamaica, make meaning of the violence they observe and experience in their particular communities and the society as a whole. The study, titled: Youth and Community Development in Canada and Jamaica: A Transnational Approach to Youth Violence, sought to compare the experiences of Jamaican and Canadian Black youth. The youth – between the ages of 18 and 24 years – told of their problems with violence; the extent to which they and their peers had become desensitized to violence; and what they thought needed to be done to address the issues and circumstances that lead to violence. The study found differences between males and females, and between rural and urban youth, hence pointing to the role that geography and gender – and relatedly education and family constellation – play in youth’s perceptions and experiences with violence.
Andrea Davis teaches in the Department of Humanities, and the Graduate Programs in English, and Gender, Feminist and Women’s Studies at York University. Her research and teaching interests include Caribbean, African American and Black Canadian Literatures and Theatre; Social Histories of the African Diaspora; and Black Cultural and Feminist Studies.
Carl James teaches in the Faculty of Education and the Graduate Program in Sociology at York University in Toronto, Canada, and is the Director of the York Centre for Education and Community. His research and teaching interests include youth studies, schooling and education, masculinity in relation to race and class, and inter-island migration among Caribbean residents.
