Social center as Home: youth between togetherness and citizenship

Abstract

The emergence of dystopian scenarios notwithstanding, whereas media and conventional wisdom alike paint a bleak future for Millennials, a number of a studies show a youth tendency to experiment with new temporal representations, relative to both past and future, form the individual and collective point of view, in the private and public sphere, exercising their citizenship right as a mean of fighting against social inequalities. 
This paper, using data collected via qualitative interviews and ethnographic observation, scrutinizes the 'resistance practices' implemented by groups of young people, gravitating around the Social Center scene in Milan, practices meant to confronts the risks and uncertainties of contemporary society. The underlying theme is the re-appropriation and re-signification of urban spaces as a way to re-act to a sense of not belonging, a way to re-build the public sphere, in order to implement new forms of political activism and resistance.