ERIC Number: EJ832165
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2007-Sep
Pages: 20
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1367-6261
EISSN: N/A
Global Selves: Marginalised Young People and Aesthetic Reflexivity in Inhalant Drug Use
MacLean, Sarah
Journal of Youth Studies, v10 n4 p399-418 Sep 2007
Sociologists have observed that young people increasingly draw on global as well as local images in their constructions of individual selfhood. This article provides a narrative analysis of stories of inhalant use-induced hallucination, drawn from interviews conducted with young people in Melbourne, Australia. Young people's stories of the hallucinations they experience while using inhalants frequently reference the narratives, images and ontological preoccupations of contemporary popular culture; in particular, interactive electronic games. I argue that drug use provides a means by which some marginalised young people are able to integrate their constructions of selfhood within wider networks of power expressed through global popular culture, through mobilising what Scott Lash has referred to as an "aesthetic" form of reflexivity. This occurs when they construct and narrate their hallucinations through four practices identified as central skills for engaging with contemporary texts: immersion, viewing the world as a hybrid technological self, re-imagining place and play on the borders of story worlds. The research highlights the need to develop drug-treatment interventions that will enable marginalised young people to fulfil--in less harmful ways--the imperative to be part of the globalising world. (Contains 1 figure.)
Descriptors: Popular Culture, Drug Use, Inhalants, Young Adults, Adolescents, Foreign Countries, Interviews, Personal Narratives, Games, Intervention, Video Games
Routledge. Available from: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. 325 Chestnut Street Suite 800, Philadelphia, PA 19106. Tel: 800-354-1420; Fax: 215-625-2940; Web site: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Opinion Papers
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Australia
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A