Mental health has traditionally been explained via medical knowledge, positioning biological pathology and pharmacological treatments as key in addressing psychiatric and psychological ailments. This article introduces the prospect of ecologics as a guide for communities committed to responding to mental health concerns in respectful and ethical…

This paper presents the initial data from a larger project, considered through the lens of failure from the perspective of Halberstam's "The Queer Art of Failure" (2011) as a way of resisting hegemonic narratives about success and how it is culturally defined. As suggested by Halberstam's use of failure, the limitations or undesirable…

This paper reflects on a research-creation project that investigates the ways in which surveillance is experienced by youth as an embodiment that might be difficult to articulate in words but rather expressed affectively, through emotion and social practice. Our argument is that the aesthetic intervention provoked by research-creation can…

In this paper we respond to this special issue's critical focus on mental health in education by considering the medicalised and homogenising approaches to the mental health of young people and the severely negative consequences for young people. Our argument is underpinned by the need to destabilise the hegemony of the current dominant discourses…

This paper explores the personal experiences of Sandra Kaire as a postdoctoral researcher who worked with Margaret Somerville in relation to methodological approaches. The ideas were initially developed in consultation when Sandra worked together with Margaret at Western Sydney University, Australia. The paper explores Sandra's personal…

One of the first ways some trans youth narrate their gender is through the process of choosing a name. Trans youth's negotiation of naming is particularly complex as they juggle family affinities and independence, as well as try on new identities and build relationships with peers. In the midst of transitioning, and often while still materially…

Current conceptualizations of youth impact the ways in which youth are understood and shape and limit the questions and policy solutions that educational theorists, practitioners and researchers can envision. This article asserts that critical arts pedagogies can create more expansive possibilities for research and practices aiming to support…

The authors report on a youth agency study conducted in post-conflict school settings in Sri Lanka. In a three-month field-based, qualitative research study, youth collaborated with the first author to explain and expand on their interviews. Their candor and concern for ensuring that the researcher understood the rationales behind their actions…

Indigenous Australian young people comprise over 50% of the total Indigenous population (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2017). Yet, the voices of Indigenous young people are seldom centred in policy or scholarship (Shay & Sarra, 2021). This paper shares findings from a three-year national transdisciplinary, qualitative study that explored…

This study explores the conditions that provide new opportunities for youth of color to develop civic agency, paving the way to enact change in their schools and communities. This article shares findings from a qualitative study of an after-school program designed and implemented by the authors, in which 15 middle school-aged youth--including a…

In the context of heightened worldwide migration, emotion-based discourses portraying migrants as fearsome and dangerous continue to regulate nation-state boundaries. This paper reports on a critical visual research study in which migrant youth living in New York City were given digital cameras and asked to take pictures of places they thought…

The news of a 16-year old teenager hacking a 13-year old boy to death in a toilet unprovoked in a secondary school in Singapore shook the whole nation in July 2021. In this article, we analyze the institutionalizing responses to the growing sense of youth mental health crisis in Singapore, catalyzed by River Valley High School incident, as the…

In this paper, I share the process of designing, implementing, and analyzing a community-based methods course alongside youth organizers, adult allies, and teacher candidates (TCs) through a critical qualitative research project. Informed by intergenerational grassroots community organizations, community-based pedagogy is a praxis to center the…

The mythology of liberal anti/racism endures in U.S. mainstream educational discourse as the rational approach to address white supremacy, with college-going positioned as "the" pathway to a better life. Liberal logics suppose that once racialized peoples enter positions of power, society will improve. Drawing upon pláticas and…

This article details what occurred during a youth participatory action research (YPAR) project involving Puerto Rican undergraduates who at first focused their analysis on how their experiences with Hurricane María could be framed as resiliency and then eventually adopted a framework of resistance to further capture their actions, stances, and…