​Sociology Seminar | Youth, Education and Work: Emerging Mobilities in Asia

Existing research on young people’s education and work mobilities in Asia have largely treated these two as separated forms of migration or as sequentially connected. Even as transnational youth mobilities in Asia continue to be driven by aspirations around education and work among others (leisure, philanthropy, marriage, etc.), the types of mobility have become increasingly diverse, complex, and temporarily variegated. Current migration and education policy often encourage youth mobility under the expectation that mobility will provide individual youth with cosmopolitan outlook and better life chances, and also benefit local and national economies via knowledge and skills circulation. Work experience is now considered a critical component to education under a renewed emphasis on workforce-readiness and industry-relevant capabilities. In this talk, I outline a research plan to examine the Overseas Work Stints phenomenon within East and Southeast Asia, focusing on educated youths’ experiences of short-term overseas work mobilities in ‘traditional’ and ‘non-traditional’ host cities. This research underscores the way education and work increasingly inform each other in shaping transnational youth mobilities, and presents a novel opportunity to understand OWS as a mobility regime and its linkages to the shifting meanings of education, work, and youth. Additionally, I discuss the potential impact of this project a swell as underline possible avenue for (future) collaboration.