A wonderful but uncertain time: Youth transitions of Erasmus students and Lisbon’s housing crisis

The city of Lisbon, with a population of around 500,000 inhabitants (2,800,000 including the surrounding metropolitan region), has recently been attracting the attention of real estate investors, international students, tourists and lifestyle migrants. However, the city’s success as an international learning hub and its capacity to attract visitors, and capital, from abroad are far from being random outcomes. In fact, the organization and publicity generated by hosting certain major events reflects a repositioning of Lisbon as one of the most visited, and most touristified, cities in the European Union.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

Understanding international students beyond studentification: a new class of transnational urban consumers. The example of Erasmus students in Lisbon (Portugal)

For the last 10 years the city of Lisbon has been receiving an increasing number of international students, expanding considerably the supply of student accommodation. In spite of the resulting rise of a new and underdeveloped housing market directed to students, studentification is not exhibiting the usual concentration and segregation patterns of clustering across the city. On the contrary, the effects of student-related economic activities are spreading throughout Lisbon, overlapping with several urban transformations. An examination of international students’ lifestyles in Lisbon seems to demonstrate that diverse youth cultures of Erasmus students are colonising different districts and activities through diverse processes of belonging and distinction. Beyond the studentification literature (and its housing-supply centred perspective) it is necessary to recognise that international students become involved in broader urban processes such as the tourism industry, marginal gentrification or entrepreneurial creativity, thus becoming a new class of transnational urban consumersinfo:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

Mobility, social status, and cooperative practices in the Sucupira Hiace Central Station, Santiago Island, Cape Verde

Cape Verde's main interurban public transport hubs, the Hiace minibus stations, provide a look into the patterns and processes of mobility, urbanization, and aspirations for modernity in the archipelago. In this article, we examine the history of Hiace vehicles, the regulations and rules governing their circulation, the social status of drivers as mobility providers, and everyday interactions between passengers and drivers in the central Hiace minibus station of Sucupira, on the island of Santiago. The formation of a cooperative unit inside the Hiace is at the core of these interactions, challenging the usual preconceptions about practices of “capturing passengers” in the station. The multiplicity of social relations embedded in the station and during the trips, we argue, reflects popular forms of self-organization and cooperation in traveling, as well as notions of mobility, social status, and culture that articulate everyday life for both collective transport drivers and working-class commuters in Cape Verdean society.info:eu-repo/semantics/submittedVersio

Mobility at the margins

The final part of this book looks at several undercurrents within youth mobility research, many of which have not featured prominently in mainstream studies in this field. In terming this section ‘mobility at the margins,’ there is also acknowledgement that while moving for education, work or training has been a relatively normative expectation for many young people for many years, there are still forms of youth circulation that are relatively undocumented or misunderstood, perhaps due to a certain level of discomfort in coming to terms with certain situations. Academic research has tended to emphasise the wide variety of individual lifestyle benefits and further professional possibilities available to young people who move, leaving the task of documenting the negative aspects to journalists, with policymakers perhaps preferring to finance interventions via civil society organizations (with limited budgets for conducting research) or focusing on issues that reflect politicians’ own beliefs rather than the voices of migrants. As such, we lack critical engagement with the consequences of exploitation within youth mobility, with a failure to recognize the unsustainability of the hegemonic neoliberal view of young people’s circulation as a means of generating economic capital for external parties such as universities. This extends to repercussions emerging from the rapid expansion of both the modes of travel and heightened levels of circulation, in addition to what are often quite obvious vulnerabilities within fragmented migration trajectories (see also Cairns 2021a, 2021b).info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

Southern Europe perspectives on international student mobility

During the last four decades, higher education institutions (hereafter, HEIs) have experienced an unprecedented level of internationalization, closely linked to pressures induced by economic globalization (Kehm and Teichler 2007). The dominance of post-industrial capitalism, a revolution brought about by new information technologies and the postcolonial scenario of emerging countries demanding access to higher education are at the core of a worldwide engagement with internationalization (Lumby and Foskett 2016). The demand for status-generating tertiary education from middle class and elite families in countries such as China, India, South Korea, Brazil and Nigeria has stimulated the struggle between nations that seek to dominate the global education market (Waters and Leung 2013). The most prominent universities in the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and Germany have begun offering distance education courses, joint programmes and academic partnerships, opening campus branches overseas and, of course, recruiting as many mobile students as possible (Walker 2014). In this sense, internationalization might rather be labelled ‘transnationalization’ as its principal feature is not the expansion of HEIs on an international scale but rather the commercialization of educational goods and services worldwide (Verger et al. 2016). In fact, educational goods are now included in the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) of the World Trade Organization (WTO).info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

A génese traumática do património em Lisboa: símbolos e representações urbanas nos bairros típicos depois do terremoto de 1755

A cidade de Lisboa nasceu no que hoje conhecemos como os bairros orientais, aqueles que povoam as encostas da Colina de São Jorge (Castelo, Alfama, Mouraria). Durante a Idade Media e depois com o Renascimento e a crescente importância do império marítimo português a cidade cresce e se espalha pelos vales dos arredores e sobretudo pela orla marítima. Nesta nova cidade que desceu da sua colina originária forma-se uma bipolarização urbana entre dos espaços centrais: O Rossio (que representa a cidade medieval e popular ligada ao mundo rural imediatamente adjacente) e o Terreiro do Paço (que representa o poder da Coroa e das instituições no nascente império marítimo). Depois do terremoto de 1755 o Marquês de Pombal, responsável pela reconstrução da cidade, altera este antigo ordem sócio-urbanístico desnaturalizando o espaço de representação popular da cidade, o Rossio. O crescimento da cidade de Lisboa os séculos XVIII e XIX vai ser assim organizado por uma nova bipolarização em duas grandes avenidas, marcadas ao mesmo tempo pelas novas categorias sociais da época: Avenida da Liberdade como espaço burguês e Avenida Almirante Reis como artéria operária. Nesta cidade moderna que crescia e se urbanizava para o seu interior os autores românticos começam a imaginar a autenticidade perdida desde a reforma pombalina nos bairros antigos, aqueles que se situam nas encostas da colina do Castelo. Neles, as antigas estruturas urbanísticas medievais (muitas vezes reconstruidas) e o florescimento de práticas e géneros de raiz popular (muitas vezes estimulados pela presença de camadas populacionais procedentes do interior de país) alimentarão esta imagem dos bairros antigos como lugares transbordantes de autenticidade. De forma crescente desde o Estado Cultural do novecentos, as instituições e as administrações tentaram aproveitar a vitalidade destas manifestações populares para legitimar a sua governabilidade. Dois exemplos são bem manifestos deste intento de manipulação dos materiais simbólicos da cidade pelo proveito das autoridades: 1. A natureza inatingível do Fado como canto popular gerado nas margens da cidade e desde a marginalidade das camadas mais desfavorecidas. 2. As Marchas Populares como manifestação domesticada da singularidade dos bairros que compõem a cidade. Assim, Fado e Marchas Populares serão manifestações ligadas à criatividade popular dos bairros antigos, e desta maneira constituirão materiais simbólicos desejados pelas autoridades desde que o urbanismo pós-pombalino gerou o imaginário de duas cidades separadas: A cidade nova – moderna - centro marcada pela reforma Pombalina e as suas evoluções oitocentistas (racional, ordenada, cosmopolita, autoritária) e o seu oposto, a cidade antiga – bairro (caótica, familiar, comunitária, popular).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

"Tornar-se outra pessoa”: narrativas de transformação subjetiva e processos de distinção entre os jovens estudantes Erasmus em Lisboa

O programa de mobilidade estudantil universitária ERASMUS é bem conhecido em toda a Europa, deslocando anualmente uns 250.000 alunos por 33 países. Os seus princípios de intercâmbio cultural, ensino na pluralidade e mobilidade transnacional fazem dele o programa bandeira dos ideais da União Europeia, com um alto grado de apreciação política e de popularidade geral. Aliás, as experiências de descobrimento pessoal, emancipação e abertura ao cosmopolitismo dos jovens no estrangeiro, constituem um ritual de passo incontornável na cultura juvenil dum determinado grupo social que vai ser caracterizado pelo seu “capital de mobilidade”. Os Erasmus, entre “migrantes estudantis” e “turistas juvenis” chegam entre a maravilha e a comoção num país diferente do seu, adaptam-se ou rejeitam os seus contextos iniciais, buscam novas vidas e finalmente “descobrem-se a sim mesmos” nesse novo lugar. O período Erasmus vai ser marcado pelos processos de trânsito das suas vidas para novas subjetividades, sempre definidas pelas estratégias de distinção e de diferenciação que procurarão respeito dos outros jovens num novo contexto. Neste artigo vamos conhecer os percursos vitais e as modalidades adaptativas de 6 estudantes estrangeiros em Lisboa segundo as suas próprias narrativas de deslocamento juvenil e adaptação urbana. The ERASMUS Programme to study abroad is well known throughout Europe, involving about 250,000 exchange students traveling annually through 33 countries. The principles of cultural exchange, education in diversity and transnational mobility make it the banner program for the ideals of the European Union and has a high degree of popularity and consideration among politicians and common people. Moreover, the experiences of personal discovery, emancipation and openness to the cosmopolitanism of those students when they are abroad, constitute an essential “rite of passage” of a particular social group of youth characterized for embodying “Mobiliy Capital”. The “Erasmus”, considered always as a mixture between “student migration” and “youth tourism” are wondered or shocked when they first arrive to a country different than theirs. They adapt or reject their initial contexts and contacts, seeking for a new lives, to finally “discover themselves” in new places (and through new selves). Their Erasmus period is characterized by the transition processes of their lives towards new subjectivities, that are always defined by the strategies of distinction and differentiation of themselves in opposition to other young people in the new context. In this article we will present the life pathways and patterns of adaptation of six foreign students in Lisbon according to their narratives of youth mobility and urban adjustment

Lisbon, the Portuguese Erasmus city? Mis-match between representation in urban policies and international student experiences

This article looks at the mis-match between official discursive representations aimed at promoting Lisbon, the Portuguese capital city, as an international student hub and international students’ experiences. At a theoretical level, our work builds on the idea that re-branding a city’s image in terms of creativity, innovation and new technologies with a view to attract international students can foster less positive urban changes linked to gentrification, pushing overseas students away rather than attracting greater numbers. Discussion includes consideration of the success of policies at the municipal level that have aimed to use international students as a means to re-brand the city as a center for creativity and innovation, a part of the wider strategy of putting Lisbon on the map as a global learning destination. Analysis includes assessment of publicity materials advertising the city’s appeal to international students, juxtaposed with findings from interviews conducted with incoming students at the city’s universities during 2020. This material illustrates some of the most prominent contradictions, and arguably, a number of shortcomings, in the city’s imagological strategy, particularly in regard to concerns with Lisbon’s housing market.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

‘There was no freedom to leave’: Global South international students in Portugal during the COVID-19 Pandemic

This article looks at the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on international students, focusing on Portuguese-speaking African and Brazilian students during the lockdown of spring 2020. Using evidence from interviews conducted with 27 students domiciled in Portugal, we illustrate some of the challenges faced by students when coping with the pandemic, including difficulties in meeting the cost of tertiary education and the centrality of working to sustain their stays abroad, alongside the emotional impact of prolonged domestic confinement and separation from families. We also consider the paradoxes of online teaching, which have made visible the digital gap between local and international Global South students in the context of their stays. In this sense, pre-existing inequalities are more at the centre of students’ concerns than new issues raised by COVID-19, a pandemic that served to reveal former injustice in the context of global capitalism. In our conclusion, we argue that there is a need for greater recognition of the vulnerabilities facing certain African and Brazilian students at Global North universities in the context of contemporary neoliberalism, including their dependence upon precarious work. Policy responses include the need for a more serious involvement and responsibility by both home and host higher education institutions in the lives of their students abroad.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

Conclusion: Youth migration in the age of pandemic immobility

This concluding chapter takes account of recent developments in the field of public health. Had it not been for the global spread of Covid-19 in 2020, youth mobility might well have continued along its decades long course of global expansion and diversification, spreading into different forms of education, work and training, with the dividing line between mobility for these purposes and tourism continuing to blur. These concerns are no longer as pressing as they once were, and may not return to being high priorities for a very long time. Right now, writing in the middle of what has come to feel like an open-ended pandemic, all we can do is look at what has happened in the last few months and attempt to grasp some of the main consequences for young people who still wish or need to be mobile, in addition to engaging with the pressing problem of how to re-orient mobility practices that have stalled or never got off the ground, literally and figuratively. Additional concerns are evident in regard to how to maintain mobility systems at a time when institutions have closed their doors, again literally and figuratively, and are struggling to re-open in any meaningful sense of the word.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio