Etnicitet i ungdomsvården. Yrkesverksammas och ungdomarnas muntliga framställningar

The aim of this study is to analyze when and how ethnicity is actualised through categorisations in Swedish youth-care, to attract attention to how these categorisations are indicated and point out how the narrators own ethnic identity is shaped and upheld through different markings. The report is based on 109 interviews conducted with different actors in the youth-care and my field-notes made in connection with the different meetings, spontaneous conversations before and after the interviews, and when visiting different institutions, work-places, etc.

Ethnicity is used explicitly as well as implicitly, by the youths themselves and the professionals, in peer relations within each collective and between the collectives. Usually ethnicity is used as an explanation and as an instrument in the interaction, i.e. it is used to achieve different things or to emphasize or highlight a desirable image of people or problems at hand.

The professionals use ethnicity to explain the youths actions, they also compare themselves to colleagues regarding who displays the greatest ethnic consideration or who knows most about ethnicity. Ethnicity then becomes a resource in presenting one-self: you present yourself as, for instance, “culturally competent” in relation to others.

The youths also use ethnicity when they talk about the placing at various institutions, the social control at the institution, discrimination, love relations, etc. The life in the institution becomes ethnically charged in interviews with youngsters, but this perspective is not always shared by other actors. Treatments interpreted as ethnic discrimination by the youths are sometimes seen as self-inflicted by the staff, e.g. as a result of alleged inappropriate behaviour. Ethnicity is a contested marker in this context and thus a potential weapon in the interplay. This is specially highlighted through ethnically coloured profanity and name-calling which the youths experience as an instrument of humiliation.

Sometimes ethnicity is portrayed as a resource, as an asset for the actors in the youth-care, providing tools for comprehending and implementing situations and projects. Things that are made comprehensible and are implemented (or said to have been implemented) often become problematic from the actors perspective. This happening doesn’t have to be a problem in itself, it rather clarifies how actors use ethnicity to demonstrate problems.