Saint-Denis au fur et à mesure. Séminaire TRYSPACES – Transformations /jeunesses/ espaces publics

TRYSPACES (Youth, Spaces and Transformations) is a 6-year research program funded and coordinated by Julie-Anne Bourdeau of INRS (Institut national de la recherche scientifique du Québec) in Montreal. It brings together four research teams focusing on four urban areas: Montreal, Mexico City, Hanoi and the Paris region. The Local Studies sector is a partner in this research, and as such benefits from funding (student grants) enabling it to investigate new fields of study, or to work on disseminating and sharing the work carried out. The program has already enabled a study to be carried out on the Basilique district, focusing on the tensions that accompanied the 2018 soccer World Cup and its retransmission on the îlot 8 slab, and a scholarship enabled a student to take part in the organization of the “Young people and institutions” seminar and its proceedings. Finally, a student also funded by the Tryspaces program took part in the “sensitive geography” project involving young people in the northern and eastern districts of Saint-Denis. The concepts used in TRYSPACES form the common theoretical framework on which the various research projects in the 4 countries are based. In turn, this work will enable shared analyses to be developed and new theoretical contributions to be made. The issue of transgressions committed by young people in the public space raises questions about the way we think about social constructs and their evolution, about the question of rules, the conditions of their enactment and regulation, and about what life in the public space shows us about what we don’t want to see.