Youth Studies Australia vol.14 no.3
September 1995

Generation Pulp: Entertainment and the postmodern generation, by Susan Hopkins
Youth Studies Australia, v.14 n.3 pp.14-17.
Working with young people, particularly those in their mid to late teens, increasingly requires working through complex relationships to media discourse. Casting Quentin Tarantino's film, Pulp Fiction, as a Gen-X cultural product, this paper discusses the issues surrounding the postmodern generation, a generation that "defines itself by entertainment discourse".

Youth, government and violence in the media: Perspectives on the media 'effects' debate, by Gordon Tait, Gavin Kendall & Belinda Carpenter
Youth Studies Australia, v.14 n. 3 pp.19-24.
The film 'Pulp Fiction', discussed in the preceding paper, carries an 'R' classification in Australia, meaning many of the generation to whom the film has great appeal are restricted from viewing it. The violence in the film and its graphic depiction of drug use caused much debate when the film was released in late 1995. The debate on violence and the media familiarly centres on the effects of that violence and the consequent need for control of media products (through censorship and classification) as well as control of the way, and by whom, they are consumed (such as parental supervision of television viewing). This double feature presents an overview of the "effects" debate by John Langer, and in the paper by Tait, Kendall & Carpenter, introduces a whole different dimension to the debate, asking why the debate occurs in the form in which it does.

Sounds of the Street, by Phil Nunn
Youth Studies Australia, v.14 n.3 pp.25-27.
An inner-city program uses creative musical experience to effect change in the lives of disadvantaged young people.

Coordination in youth affairs: Why is it less successful than multicultural and women's affairs?, by John Ewen
Youth Studies Australia, v.14 n.3 pp.28-37.
Why it has failed to work, and how we could do better. In Volume 14 n.2 of YSA, Quentin Beresford and Susan Robertson (1995, p.13) analysed the impact of coordination in youth affairs in Western Australia and between the Commonwealth and States. They argued that coordinating bodies are often established without a clear idea of what they are supposed to be coordinating, and how coordination was to be achieved. In their example of the WA Youth Affairs Bureau, performance was considerably less than that anticipated by its proponents, partly resulting from its location in a non-powerful service-delivery department, and partly from the lack of weighty political support. In their Commonwealth/States example, they reveal problems of power-relations, mistrust, and a general wariness of senior officials to be involved in the quagmire of youth policy issues, as combining to reduce the coordinating machineries to "non-decision making". Yet, as a federal election approaches, we again find that political parties (competing to attract the youth vote) are debating how better to coordinate youth affairs. The Liberals have announced their intention to establish a Ministry of Youth Affairs. Labour have labelled such a move as a gimmick. How is it that coordination in other sectors (particularly in women's issues and multicultural affairs) has been so successful, and co-ordination in youth affairs so disappointing? This article seeks to compare the success rate of Australian Government machineries in these three areas, and to deduce a preferred optimum model for youth affairs, and the essential environment for its success.

Victim awareness as a core program for young offenders, by Aldis Putnins
Youth Studies Australia, v.14 n.3 pp.38-41.
Aldis Putnins reviews a South Australian program based on increasing the awareness in young offenders of the experiences of crime victims.

The search for a feminism that could accommodate homeless young women, by Karen Crinall
Youth Studies Australia, v.14 n.3 pp.42-47.
Young women experiencing homelessness are confronted by a range of oppressive circumstances. Their disadvantage is multi-layered; they are young, they are women, they do not have access to safe, secure accommodation and they are poor. While these young women do not constitute a homogeneous group, they share gendered experiences of victimisation from within their families, their peer group and their wider social networks. Their active resistance to becoming victims is displayed in many aspects of their practices and behaviours. This paper discusses some of the queries that arose in the course of examining the relevance of feminism for understanding the experience of young women's homelessness. In particular some poststructural concepts are used to question the processes of victimisation as conceptualised from a more traditional feminist framework. The paper ends by suggesting that feminist work practice might need to develop more of an understanding of these processes and what they mean in young women's experience if they are to be adequately and effectively addressed.

Research in progress: Young people and the criminal economy, by Rob White
Youth Studies Australia, v.14 n.3 pp.48-49.
In the present economic climate, many young people have been deeply affected by unemployment, poverty and the social ills associated with identity crisis and marginalisation. This article provides an overview of a research project which is premised upon the idea that changing economic circumstances, especially high rates and long duration of unemployment, will have a significant impact on the life options and lifestyles of many young Australians.

Research in progress: Self employment, by Simon White Youth Studies Australia, v.14 n.3, p.50