Generations and Globalization: Youth, Age, and Family in the New World Economy

Abstract

Written primarily by cultural anthropologists, the collection of essays presented in this volume provides a fresh analytical perspective to the study of age, intergenerational relationships, and globalization.Critical of previous anthropological studies that polarize "the global" and the "local," a major theme woven throughout the book is the necessity of connecting structural demographic changes (e.g., population aging, the transnational migration of workers) to the role that individual agency and families play in shaping globalization and processes of inequality.As such, all of the papers in this book emphasize the ways in which intergenerational transmission and social reproduction inherent in family exchanges are critical to the movement of people through their life cycles and to the regeneration of households and the social world.Through this lens, the authors convincingly contextualize broader macrolevel questions of domestic labour, capital, the management and movement of populations, and the production of commodities.They accomplish this task by providing vignettes and case studies drawn from selected countries throughout the world (China, Mexico, Madagascar, Botswana, India, and Western Europe).A particular strength of this book is that the various stages of the life course -childhood, youth, adulthood, and old age -are not viewed as fixed or separate categories.Instead, the authors make the argument that studies of age need to transcend a single age group or cohort focus in order to examine the complex interplay between intergenerational relations and wider historical and social processes.The relevance and application of this theme is reflected in chapters that address the salience of reciprocity between the generations as they engage in productive activity within changing environments.For example,

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