Youth Futures and Precarious Urbanism

Manisha Priyam is Sir Louis Matheson Distinguished Visiting Professor, Monash University and has academic writings and research on themes of Education Policy Reforms and Youth Lives.Mona G. Mehta, Associate Professor and Associate Dean, Arts at Ahmedabad University researches the cultural politics of urban transformations.Divya Vaid, an Associate Professor of Sociology at Jawaharlal Nehru University, studies social mobility and social inequalities from both macro and micro perspectives.

• Introduction: Urban transformations, youth aspirations, and education in India 1. The ‘wall’: reflections on youth aspiration, education and social mobility in India 2. The limits of recovery: coming of age, aspirations and (im)mobility among displaced Pandit youth in Jammu 3. ‘Upgrading’ in precarious times: social mobility, skills and entrepreneurship among pastoralist youth in urbanising Gujarat 4. Shifting ruralities: a case study of higher education, tourism and youth in Banjar sub-district, Kullu, Himachal Pradesh 5. Land dispossession, aspirational asymmetries and dilemmas of the rural youth 6. Bounded aspirations and youth capacity: interrogating public higher education in North India 7. Caste, gig-economy, and youth: the resurgence of a new age caste politics in urban Gujarat 8. Fragmentation, diversity, and inequality: the city and everyday youth culture 9. “If not work, then what?”: work, ambition, and satisfaction among young women in urban India