Carles Feixa

• PhD
• Professor (Full) at Pompeu Fabra University

In October 2003, a young Colombian was murdered after he left the high school where he was studying in Barcelona after an alleged confrontation between two gangs composed of young people of Latin American origin – the Ñetas and the Latin Kings & Queens. This led to a wave of moral panic over the presence in Spain of the so-called ‘bandas latinas’ (...

This chapter takes up the famous thesis that Robert Park exposed in his preface to The Gang (Thrasher, The gang: A study of 1313 gangs in Chicago. The University of Chicago Press, 1927), considered the first serious scientific study on youth gangs, namely gangs are a specific type of society, which can be found in different parts of the planet and...

This report includes the ethnographic accounts from the South European region of the TRANSGANG project. Following the initial project design, the somewhat broader core case of Barcelona has been enriched through the contrast cases of Madrid, Milan and Marseille. The project follows the distinction between “major transnationalism” (or transnationali...

Ethnography and cinema as meditation tools in gang research In this article, Carles Feixa and José Sánchez-García share two main results of the Special Features of the TRANSGANG project: White Paper and Documentary films which looks at mediation tools in gang research. During the last five years, the TRANSGANG Project has investigated transnational...

Several authors have highlighted the importance of marriage as a social marker that alters the social categorization of individuals and their relationships from youth to adulthood, according to the cultural construction of the life course in Arab countries. This article analyzes the interaction between the socio-political framework (structure) and...

Casa Kolacho is an art and culture centre located in Comuna 13 in Medellín, Colombia, that opened its doors in December of 2013. Since then, it has become an international benchmark for ‘artivism’ conveyed through hip-hop culture, with high-impact initiatives such as the Graffitour, which—until the pandemic arrived—promoted community tourism and ci...

This paper is based on an ethnographic study of the arrests and the subsequent trial and sentencing of a group of Latin Kings and Queens from Barcelona between 2015 and 2020. We analyze the actions carried out by the police, judicial institutions and media to reestab-lish the "hard handed" discourse in relation to these youth street groups in a tim...

Alonso Salazar es un referente en la investigación social y en la acción política en Medellín. En 1990 publicó un libro seminal, No nacimos pa´ semilla, basado en testimonios de jóvenes pertenecientes a pandillas, a partir de un proyecto impulsado por la Corporación Región. Durante la etapa posterior, participó como miembro de la sociedad civil en...

(analítico)El artículo aborda una de las facetas del hiphop como cultura juvenil: su dimensión de movimiento social y cultural protagonizado por jóvenes de sectores subalternos. Para ello se analiza el caso de Casa Kolacho, un centro de arte y cultura situado en la Comuna 13 de Medellín, que abrió sus puertas en 2013 como culminación de la toma de...

Various authors have highlighted the importance of marriage as a social marker that alter the so-cial categorization of individuals and their relationships from youth to adulthood according to the cultural construction of the life course in Arab countries. This article aims to analyze the in-teraction between the socio-political framework (structur...

A Correction to this paper has been published: https://doi.org/10.1007/s43151-020-00028-y

This Background Paper of the TRANSGANG Working Papers reveals the multiple facets of youth street groups of four European cities: Milan, Marseille, Madrid and Barcelona. The authors show how in the guts of these cities different institutional, associative and informal agents have contributed to forging a space where migration, youth, class, order a...

Call for papers Gangs are described as an episodic phenomenon comparable across diverse geographical sites, with the US gang stereotype often operating as an archetype. Mirroring this trend, academic researchers have increasingly sought to survey the global topography of gangs through positivist methodologies that seek out universal characteristic...

Las llamadas “bandas” o “pandillas” aparecen como objeto protagonista de políticas públicas inclusivas o segregadoras en distintas ciudades del contexto iberoamericano: experiencias de mediación e integración social versus construcción de alarma mediática y punitivismo policial y penal. El presente artículo se propone analizar la situación de este...

This research aims to explore the function of intercultural communication of Chinese Rap music and the construction of hybrid identity, through discourse analysis methods: Narrative Semiotics, visual semiology, and sociolinguistics of globalization. The general context of the research is the development of global youth culture and Rap music as an i...

Gang literature increasingly reflects the importance of social media in gang lifestyle, as gang members adopt new communicative practices. Yet, because of the multifaceted nature of online gang activity and the diversity of methodologies employed, a general overview of research outcomes is not easily achieved. This article seeks to remedy this by a...

El artículo, originalmente publicado en 1989, es un esbozo de antropología de la juventud urbana, campo que el autor ha venido desarrollando desde entonces. Parte de una revisión bibliográfica de las principales aportaciones al estudio de las bandas y subculturas juveniles desde la antropología. Se centra en presentar los resultados de un trabajo d...

Human Towers are one of the most representative traditional sporting games in Catalonia, recognized in 2010 as Intangible Cultural Heritage by the United Nations Organization for Education, Science and Culture (UNESCO). The objective of this research was to study the emotional states (well-being, discomfort, and affectivity) elicited by a represent...

Jeffrey J. Juris (New Jersey, 1971-Boston, 2020) fue pionero en el estudio del movimiento altermundialista, tema al que dedicó su tesis doctoral, presentada en la Universidad de Berkeley y luego publicada en su influyente libro Networking Futures: the Movements against Corporate Globalization (2008). Ademas de los Estados Unidos, llevó a cabo traba...

(analítico): Ernesto Rodríguez (Montevideo, 1954) es uno de los referentes latinoamericanos en los estudios y las políticas de juventud. Su interés por la juventud surgió durante su militancia juvenil y maduró durante la dictadura militar uruguaya (1973-1984) en el seno de la oposición democrática. Tras la recuperación de la democracia, Rodríguez f...

(analítico): José Manuel Valenzuela Arce (Tecate, México, 1954) es doctor en sociología e investigador del Colegio de la Frontera Norte (Tijuana, México). Escritor prolífico, ha destacado en el análisis de las expresiones culturales juveniles en la frontera norte de México, desde su primer y pionero libro sobre pachucos, cholos, punks y chavos band...

O termo “geração viral” refere-se a uma faixa etária que vivencia uma dupla circunstância vital: por um lado, a exposição ao coronavírus como marca geracional; de outro, a velocidade de transmissão de informações pela internet. O artigo analisa o impacto do confinamento causado pela Covid-19 entre adolescentes, com base em um estudo de caso realiza...

This chapter focuses on the ‘do-it-yourself’ (DIY) representations of participants in the Portuguese and Brazilian underground artistic and music scenes. Through comparison, we identify the emergence of a (re)meaning of DIY relocated in the Global South, considering the socio-historical contexts of both countries. Our approach has three focal point...

Resumen (analítico)Este artículo pone de manifiesto la existencia de un elemento transversal en la relación de la juventud con la esfera pública, que contribuye a comprender mejor la naturaleza de sus expresiones políticas: la asimilación de una cierta posición periférica impuesta dentro del espacio social. La idea de espacio social, y en particula...

Resumen (analítico)Este artículo propone el concepto de Generación ₿ (o blockchain) como paradigma para analizar los movimientos juveniles en la era de la web semántica. Partiendo de conceptualizaciones anteriores sobre la Generación @ (o arroba) y sobre la Generación # (o hashtag), se presentan el significante, el significado y los rasgos de la Ge...

El artículo se propone reconstruir algunas narrativas teóricas sobre la juventud, articuladas en torno al concepto de crisis. Para ello, repasa las aportaciones de cinco autores del siglo XX, provenientes de distintas disciplinas, escuelas teóricas y coyunturas de crisis: Erik H. Erikson (1968) y su teoría sobre la juventud como “crisis normativa”;...

Analizamos los diferentes escenarios que afronta nuestro proyecto de investigación al decretarse la alerta sanitaria por Coronavirus, partiendo de un cuestionario realizado a 16 investigadores/as del proyecto TRANSGANG en el Magreb, el sur de Europa y las Américas. En primer lugar, analizamos el impacto de las medidas de distanciamiento físico sobr...

In the twenty-first century, the traditional conformation of gangs has been altered for several reasons. The present global economic situation changed the context of gangs, and as a feature of this century, the Internet and social media have shifted social relations and the way urban gang members interact. Ethnographic data demonstrate that gang me...

Schreiber (2019) sees music as energy becoming entertainment. An expression of power, and not only sonic or emotional power. Music, especially when created in response to the world’s social problems, becomes a unique force. However, not every song addressing society’s problems becomes a protest song. Let us consider the primal North American exampl...

On the occasion of the publication of the latest book in Spanish by José Machado Pais (Youth and creativity, 2020), this conversation with Carles Feixa reviews the personal and intellectual career of this Portuguese sociologist, one of the leaders in youth studies in Europe and Latin America. After evoking the teenage and youth of the protagonist i...

El artículo aborda la trayectoria del historiador colombiano Carlos Mario Perea, centrándose en sus aportaciones a los estudios sobre juventud. A partir de una conversación con Carles Feixa, se reconstruyen las principales etapas de su vida, como joven, militante político e investigador, desde sus recuerdos como estudiante en la Bogotá de los años...

This document is sharing the methodological perspective on ethnography and data analysis of the TRANSGANG project. The aim is to provide to the local research teams a guide about ethnographic perspectives, tools and data analyses strategy, to be able to apply using NVivo software, and some references to ensure these perspectives. The objective of t...

Gangs have been described as an episodic phenomenon comparable across diverse geographical sites, with the US gang stereotype often acting as the archetype. Mirroring this trend, academic researchers have increasingly sought to survey the global topography of gangs through positivist methodologies that seek out universal characteristics of gangs in...

Resumen (analítico): Sergio Balardini es uno de los pioneros de la «juvenología» argentina y latinoamericana. El texto se basa en una conversación mantenida por los autores en Buenos Aires en agosto de 2017 y recorre las tres vidas del protagonista: su biografía como joven, como militante político y como investigador. Empieza con sus recuerdos de a...

In this special edition on popular music, we seek to explore Simon Frith’s (1978, The sociology of rock, London, UK: Constable, p. 39) argument that: ‘Music’s presence in youth culture is established but not its purpose’. ‘Songs that sing the crisis’ captures contemporary accounts, which build upon popular music’s legacy, courage and sheer determin...

Rap and mahragan were the sound of youths that demanded freedom and social justice in Tahrir Square and in Tunisia Parliament Square sit-ins during 2011. It may have been, not merely the soundtrack of the revolution, but a motivating factor in bringing people into the streets and reshaping their basic political subjectivity: a core process of any r...

Este trabajo indaga en las distintas formas de participación juvenil que emergieron a través de los movimientos del 2011, específicamente a través del caso del 15M español. Basa la investigación en un trabajo etnográfico local, y busca comprender el espacio que ocupan los jóvenes politizados en los movimientos sociales pos-15M, así como las reaccio...

No ano 2000, Carles Feixa publicou um artigo intitulado Geração @. A juventude na era digital. O termo e sua conceituação rapidamente se popularizaram, identificando-se com as principais características da nova geração do novo século (mais tarde batizada como a Geração Millenial). Em 2014, o autor publicou um livro em que completou a reflexão com u...

This text presents the key concepts of the TRANSGANG project in the form of answers to seven research questions: what, when, who, why, where, how and what for. We start by defining the conceptual triangle configured by the title: Transnational Gangs as agents of Mediation (What). The central chapters give the historical context: Neoliberal States (...

The text is organized in five sections. Section 1, prepared by Carles Feixa and José Sánchez-Garcia, is this introduction to the entire document. Section 2, prepared by Andrés García Berrio, gives a general overview of youth street groups in legislative codes. Section 3 contains analyses of the legal codes for each TRANSGANG country. The section on...

Los jóvenes hoy. Presentación: A menos de un año de haberse realizado el Seminario Internacional Sobre Estudios de Juventud. Diálogos México. España, y después de una convocatoria para publicar en la Revista Contraste Regional de la institución Sede, presentamos el número especial dedicado a los jóvenes de Iberoamérica. En este número encontraremos...

¿Cómo aparece retratada la justicia en el cine y la televisión que vemos? ¿Qué aparece en la pantalla como la realidad» de tribunales, jueces, fiscales y abogados? Para abordar estas preguntas se propuso a los autores de este libro que escogieran una película, un director o un tema, para examinar aquello que la producción cinematográfica o televisi...

This text is an attempt to review some academic work on youth cultures carried out in Spain since the transition to democracy (although some earlier work related to the subject, stemming from the late Franco period, is also brought up). The nearly 200 contributions analyzed (books, papers, theses, unpublished reports and journal texts) were grouped...

El artículo prosigue el ciclo de conversaciones con los referentes de la investigación sobre juventudes en América Latina, iniciado con las dedicadas a Néstor García Canclini y Jesús Martín Barbero. En este caso la interlocutora es Rossana Reguillo, antropóloga y comunicóloga mexicana, de padre español exiliado, que desde los años 90s ha pensado y...

EN: The article is a reflection on the legacy of cultural studies, and its contributions to contemporary social sciences. It is based on a conversation between the authors, with Dick Hebdige in the center, and revolves around the trajectory of this British professor, communicologist and semiologist, an outstanding student of Stuart Hall. It also re...

This review article traces an overview of the studies on Latin American youth cultures over the past twenty-five years, from the 20th to the 21st century (from Generation X to Generation @), with a prologue in the Generation of Tribes and an epilogue in the Indignant Generation. From the pioneering studies on urban gangs and tribes to the most rece...

Social inequality regarding gender and social class is a topic of long-term interest in social research. However, the intersections between the two variables in the reproduction of inequalities in the field of education require further investigation. The longitudinal research project ‘Social Inequality in Higher Education’ aims to shed light on the...

RESUMO Carles Feixa Pampols é professor catedrático de antropologia social da Universidade Pompeu Fabra, em Barcelona. É doutor em Antropologia Social pela Universidade de Barcelona e Doutor Honoris Causa pela Universidade de Manizales (Colômbia). O Dr. Feixa tem se dedicado aos estudos das Culturas Juvenis, tendo publicado mais de 50 livros sobre...

The article approaches the theories of communication in/from Latin America based on the work of the Mexican anthropologist Rossana Reguillo, in particular from her book Culturas juveniles [Youth cultures], originally published in 2000 and reprinted in 2012, which has had a great impact in cultural studies, on communication and youth studies. The au...

Webster’s dictionary defines flow as ‘a smooth uninterrupted movement’ and as ‘a continuous transfer of energy’. In hip-hop culture, the word is used to express movements that blend in a musical and bodily sense, and by extension, a social and cultural sense. This is why the Young Latin Kings and Ñetas, two immigrant collectives in Barcelona who we...

Uno de los efectos de la crisis económica de 2008 ha sido la emigración de una parte de la juventud española hacia el extranjero, en especial hacia Europa. Las narrativas culturales del fenómeno son ambivalentes: por una parte se ve como una aventura atractiva (que animan a emprender algunos políticos y empresarios), por otra parte se ve como un ex...

On Saturday July 23, 2011, Guillermo, a young student from Lleida (Catalonia, Spain), who had been camping out since the beginning of the 15M movement, arrived in Madrid after walking over 450 kilometers, in one of the six columns that had crossed the Iberian Peninsula during the previous weeks. The “Popular Indignant March” had been conceived as a...

Com són els millenials lleidatans? Què opinen sobre l'educació i la família, el treball i l'atur, l'oci i la cultura, el barri i la ciutat, la salut i l'afectivitat, la participació i la política? Com veuen la ciutat on viuen i quines millores hi voldrien introduir, també en les seues vides? Què els iguala i què els diferencia de les generacions an...

El presente texto plantea una reflexión sobre la metamorfosis de los movimientos juveniles en la transición de la era digital a lo que podemos denominar era hiperdigital (es decir, la era de la web social). Dicha transición se sintetiza en un cambio terminológico: Generación @ o Arroba versus Generación # o Hashtag. El artículo se organiza en dos p...

Los procesos de cambios y transformaciones sociopolíticas que han ve-nido ocurriendo en diversos lugares del mundo encuentran en una multipli-cidad de formas asociativas juveniles, (actores, sujetos o agentes, depen-diendo de la perspectiva teórica que resulte pertinente para aproximarse a dichas formas) fuerzas sociales de enorme influencia que, s...

A peregrinação é um ritual religioso que consiste em fazer um percurso a pé ou mediante outros meios de transporte, individual ou em grupo, que tem como meta chegar a uma cidade ou santuário comum a conotação sagrada e com uma finalidade espiritual. Na Península Ibérica, o Caminho de Santiago de Compostela constitui a máxima expressão deste ritual,...

El propósito del presente artículo es describir e interpretar un relato de vida obtenido en el Pirineo Aragonés, así como reflexionar sobre las historias de vida como aproximación metodológica en el contexto de las ciencias sociales. El relato surgió a partir de una experiencia formativa en el ámbito del «Máster Universitario en Antropología: inves...

RESUMEN En los últimos años y en países del norte y sur del Mediterráneo, han surgido movimientos juveniles de protesta hacia las instituciones políticas y econó-micas, de los cuales destacan la «primavera árabe» y los «indignados» en España, modelos que han desarrollado formas de actuación diferentes. El presente artículo discute dos cuestiones bá...

Recently, social movements worldwide have introduced innovations in their communication methods. The #spanishrevolution that started on 15 May 2011 shows this new-style communication in action. Amidst regional election campaigning, thousands of people, mainly young, took to the streets and occupied Spain’s main squares, becoming known as the Outrag...

Youth lives are inscribed in specific times and spaces. Both in social history and in life stories, times and spaces are not separated but connected: this connectivity is called “chronotope.” The academic use of the concept derives from the work of the Russian literature critic Mikhail Bakhtin. The notion was borrowed from physics and mathematics (...

En tiempos de crisis, las políticas de juventud están experimentando enormes recortes y transformaciones hasta el punto que hemos llegado a preguntarnos si realmente existen como políticas públicas con entidad propia. La situación en la que se encuentran muchos sujetos jóvenes en España les lleva a preguntarse dónde están las redes de protección tr...

The methodological approach of the SAHWA project responds to the call of the European 7FP under the topic SSH.2013.4.1-2 “Facing transition in the South and East Mediterranean area: empowering the young generation” by conducting a systematic analysis of young people political participation, economic prospects, job opportunities, and the experience...

This session is based on the contributions to a book with the same title, to be published by Brill in 2014. It follows some similar themes represented in a previous edited collection published following the International Sociology Association World Congress in Brisbane, Australia in 2002 (Feixa & Nilan, Global Youth? Hybrid cultures, plural worlds,...

The aim of this article is to present and discuss the situation regarding young people and youth policy in Spain via the parameters of the magic triangle linking policy, research and action: (1) the situation of young people in Spain today – some indicators are highlighted regarding the main challenges and opportunities for young people, with refer...

The main aim of this Concept Paper (CP) for the Project “Researching Mediterranean Arab Youth: Towards a new social contract” (SAHWA) is to show a conceptual guide for research as a whole. More than an established map, we conceive it as a compass in order to help us in the trip that we launch; or better as an astrolabe to ensure we do not sink, cha...

In the difficult transition from youth to adult life, youth policies have traditionally been seen as a heaven, a place in the desert where to rest, rehydrate and prepare for your onward journey. But in times of crisis, the oasis can become a mirage, a sort of intransitive non-place, where the supply of water is evaporated as the effect of austerity...