Intersectional analysis of youth violence and comment to the manual

1. Intersectional analysis of youth violenceand comment to the manual 05.+ 06.02.2009 in Berlin „Peer Think“ International Conference Prof. Dr. Wassilis Kassis, University Osnabrück, Fachbereich 03 Erziehungs- und Kulturwissenschaften, Institut für Erziehungswissenschaft

2. The starting point • Intersection of ethnicity, social status and gender on violence development. • What assumptions underlie intersectional perspectives in education? • Is there any evidence to demonstrate that ethnicity, class and gender intersect the violence development?

3. The Complexities of Intersectionality There are three different approaches to studying intersectionality (Leslie McCall) • Anticategorical Complexity: deconstruction of categorical divisions • Intracategorical Complexity: recognizes the apparent shortcomings of existing social categories and it questions the way in which they draw boundaries of distinction • Intercategorical Complexity: use existing categorical distinctions to document inequality across multiple dimensions

4. Girls against boys and girlsBoys against boys Girls Boys

5. Faktorenanalyse: Täterinnen-Mädchen Schritt 2 Schritt 1 Schritt 3

6. Faktorenanalyse: Täter-Jungen: Mädchen/Jungen Schritt 1 Schritt 2

7. Häufigkeit Mädchen- Jungengewalt

8. Faktorenanalyse: Täter-Jungen: Jungen Schritt 1 Schritt 2 Schritt 3

9. Components of violence socialization Violence = f(SDF, SC, Peer, Fam, School, Dom) SDF Gender, Status, nationality SC Self concept Peer Peers-socialization Fam Family-socialization School School-socialization Dom Dominance-orientation

10. Social Status • SES: SocioEconomicalStatus (Hoffmeyer-Zlotnik & Geis, 2003) • Three components (own books, education parents, status of the job of parents) z-standardised • Low SES • Middle SES • High SES

11. The empirical way of verifying the intersectional approach • Discriminant analysis (DA): You use DA to identify from a greater list of variables the factors who best characterize the differences among two or more groups. In our analyses we work with two groups: (a) the violent and (b) the non-violent adolescents. • The result of a DA can be used as a function

12. The data funnel Gender, Status, nationality, Self concept, Peers-socialization, Family-socialization, School-socialization, Dominance-orientation

13. Violent Girls: Personal and social determinants of physical aggression 2008-2011 Osnabrueck Youth-Study 2008: Violence in the school

14. Sample • Questionnaire study 2008 • Osnabrueck, Northwestern Germnay • 779 Adolescents (15-16 years old) • 456 students in secondary schools with advanced classes (n=Realschule) and 323 in secondary schools with basic classes (Hauptschule). • The 335 girls and 438 boys participating in the study were on average 15.5 years old • 567 (72.8%) were German and 203 (26.1%) foreigners

15. Adolescent groups in our intersectional research (each group 50-80 students) Adolescents Boys Girls German boys Migrant boys German girls Migrant girls High SES German boys High SES Migrant boys High SES German girls High SES Migrant girls Middle SES German boys Middle SES Migrant boys Middle SES German girls Middle SES Migrant girls Low SES Migrant girls low SES German boys Low SES Migrant boys Low SES German girls

16. Boys and Girls

17. Boys Total

18. boys

19. Boys low (♂▼)

20. Boys high (♂▲)

21. Foreign boys low (f♂▼)

22. German boys low (g♂▼)

24. girls

25. girls

26. Girl low (♀▼)

27. Girls high (♀▲)

28. Foreign girls low (f♀▼)

29. German girls low (g♀▼)

31. Summary • Violence comes in packages. • There are no superkids, no superparents and no superschools. • Family, school, personality and peers are interlinking socialization domains through to violence. • Violence socialization is not just a question for schools or the individual but more a request for the society.

32. Just knowing that lifewordls of adolescents are complex is not enough. • We have to include a small but diagnostic process through to identify the specific demands ore resources in the life of the youths. • If Intersectionality has to consider the complexity of educational processes practitioners and scientists have to work together. • The structures of dominance is a complex net of interconnections between social class, gender and ethnicity. • If we really like to take the adolescents out of this net we have to do a lot, not just being responsible to changing of attitudes, or zero tolerance of violence acts. • Violence is not just an obscure phenomenon but a maladaptive creation of dominance.

33. Formation of non-violent behaviour in school and leisure time among youths from violent families (STAMINA) EUROPEAN COMMISSION DG Justice, Freedom and Security 2009-2011

34. Partners • Dissens e.V., Germany; • Männerberatung Graz, Austria; • Peace Institute, Slovenia. • Universitat de Girona, Spain;

35. Research question • Research consistently finds a correlation between psychological and/or physical violence experienced within the family and later violence by youth perpetrators at school • Despite these widely known research results, it cannot be generally assumed that the development of violence among youths at school is causally determined by their social and family backgrounds

36. Thank you! Prof. Dr. phil. Wassilis Kassis wassilis.kassis@uni-osnabrueck.de Universität Osnabrück Heger-Tor-Wall 9 49069 Osnabrück