Conference Program

This contribution traces the initial phase of a research conducted in Milan, focusing on youth participation and public spaces in urban areas. It aligns with the broader framework of the MUSA project (Multi-layered Urban Sustainability Action), funded by the PNRR and dedicated to regenerating urban spaces. Among the various actors who inhabit our cities, young people represent a component to which urban policies today devote more and more attention (UN, 2015). Youth geographies (Jeffrey, 2012) are an ever-expanding area toward an attempt to understand the world of young people, their ways of being citizens, and the spaces and forms of youth participation (Pippa et al., 2021). Pedagogical reflection also questions the role of young people in the contemporary process of transformation of urban areas, with a specific focus on urban public spaces as centers of relationship and democratic participation for young people (Biswas, 2021; Biffi, 2023). The spaces of the urban dimension, in fact, are essential contexts for continuous learning through formal, nonformal and informal education. In particular, within the horizon of public pedagogy (Biesta, 2012), public spaces in urban contexts are significant spaces where (new) forms of democratic citizenship are being created (Cammaerts et al., 2016). In fact, they are often considered spaces in which young people's actions, practices and narratives – even those of underaged people – are seen as multiple political acts (Arendt, 1958).

Within the outlined theoretical framework, the B-YOUth Forum research lab has been created. Employing a participatory, intergenerational and interdisciplinary approach, it utilizes scientific research to support youth in understanding ongoing transitions in societies and their territories. It is, in fact, open to young people aged 16 to 25, alongside university students, PhD students and scholars. Specifically, this group explored the themes and the meanings of youth participation and public space with a specific focus on the squares of the Bicocca district, which are undergoing continuous transformations. Among the different public spaces in the district, some new squares are of great interest, places with a changing nature, with apparently different characteristics and uses. The research approach combined qualitative methods such as observation, audio recordings and interviews with the adoption of multiple artistic languages which not only enriched conventional research methods for data collection and analysis but also provided an authentic avenue for youth to communicate their experiences and perspectives (Groundwater-Smith et al., 2015). The utilization of arts-informed methods merged the power of artistic expression with participatory research principles, facilitating young people's exploration, understanding and reflections on issues relevant to their lives (Biffi & Zuccoli, 2006). These methods transcended cultural and language barriers, promoting diversity in communication and creating a sensorially rich experience.

To conclude, the research approach presented here promotes the cultivation of research competencies equipping the participants with the ability to critically investigate reality, promoting their emancipation (Appadurai, 2006). As the project advances, it may contribute to provide valuable insights to enhance youth participation and foster inclusive urban environments, emphasizing the dynamic role of young people in shaping urban landscapes through research itself.

Traditionally, the urban landscape has often been reduced to a background in which education takes place. As such, existing research does not pay much attention to the city and public space as an active agent in its own way (De Visscher, 2015). Within this presentation, however, I report on the findings of a study focusing on public space as a co-educator, acting as a fourth pedagogical province (De Visscher, De Bie & Verschelden, 2012) and shaping the relationship between children and youth and society (Hämäläinen, 2013). Through a combination of observations, focus groups and interviews with young people (N=53), professionals and policy makers (N=9), I studied free spaces for youth in three distinct neighbourhoods in Brussels: a social highrise estate in a green environment (Peterbos), an ethnically diverse 19th century blue collar neighbourhood (Brabant district) and a suburban commercially oriented district (Stockel). The results reveal that public space shapes young people’s everyday experiences of citizenship (Biesta, Lawy & Kelly, 2009) in various ways and offers them a picture of what society is about and what their own place in it might be. This pedagogical significance of public space is inextricably linked to processes of exclusion, privatisation and parochialisation. In some neighbourhoods, public space is sparsely used by youth and if so, mainly for private and commercial functions. Other ways of being present are often questioned, resulting in exclusion. In other neighbourhoods, spatial claims of some (male) users of public space turn it into a parochial space, characterized by a sense of community amongst acquaintances, yet resulting in exclusion of others such as youth and girls. This is further illuminated by the presence of a strong subjective feeling of insecurity (Van Kelecom, 2021), resulting in some youth feeling welcome whilst others feel excluded. In both cases, there are clear signs that public space does not only lose a public, but also the public. It loses its public nature as it loses its significance as a place that enables political action. Additionally, this loss of the public nature of public space also implies a loss of social life and common interest (De Backer, 2016). As a result, a lot of youth grow up without a sense of public good and experiences of democracy in public space (Biesta, 2012). Based on these findings, I will argue that there is a need for a public pedagogy which interrupts the existing order in public space (Biesta, 2012) and which is concerned with nurturing the public nature of public space.

This contribution aims to present the virtuous experience of involving young people in public space carried out by the “Fondazione PInAC - Pinacoteca Internazionale dell'Età Evolutiva Aldo Cibaldi” in Rezzato (BS). This educational intervention took place in a museum dedicated to children's expressiveness which collects and catalogs children's and young people's drawings by displaying them to the public through thematic exhibitions.

During the 26th ICOM General Conference held in Prague in 2022 the definition of museum was updated, highlighting, among other aspects, that it is a space open to the public, accessible and inclusive, operating with community participation. Indeed, the importance of Fondazione PInAC lies not only in the custodianship of the material cultural heritage produced by children and young people (Iuso, 2022), but also in their continuous involvement in heritage work (Zuccoli, 2022). Today, in fact, critical heritage studies affirm the need to include more of the underrepresented groups in the cultural heritages of nations, among them the social group of youth (Harrison, Dias, & Kristiansen, 2023; Sparrman, 2022).

In the process of building the exhibition that will open in the fall of 2024, Fondazione PInAC has chosen to undertake a participatory design process together with two third-grade secondary school classes, called upon to work on the heritage - fully digitalized - of drawings and propose a reasoned selection starting from their own knowledge, experiences and interests (Sparrman, 2019) with respect to the given theme. This project is part of the path for the achievement of transversal skills and the development of the ability to orient themselves in personal life and in social and cultural reality, as established by current Italian ministerial regulations.

The students were first invited to the museum to visit the archives and were trained on the evolution of the graphic-expressive language, in order to provide useful tools to implement a selection not only guided by their own aesthetic taste. They will participate in the reorganization of the exhibition space – also transforming it according to their idea of the exhibition – and then conduct guided tours with children and their families.

Giving young people the chance to design a cultural proposal aimed at their peers but also at children and adults means recognizing their dignity of existence in an institutional context, highlighting the need to enhance the meanings they attribute (Colazzo, Del Gobbo, 2022) to an international and historical heritage, on which adults have worked over time, and on which adults have mainly contributed their point of view.

This participatory process (Colazzo, Del Gobbo, 2022) within a public institution opens the door to the activation of young people as citizens and invites them to care about cultural heritage. This reminds the role of schools and cultural institutions such as museums to place themselves in dialogue with young people to accommodate their conceptions with respect to the uses and functions of public space in the cultural sphere as well, as affirmed by the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and Adolescent (United Nations, 1989).

The urgencies posed by the contemporary world challenge pedagogical, educational, and formative research to carefully reflect on the evolution of issues affecting young people, in all contexts of life and at a global level. Topics such as the inclusion and enhancement of other cultures, deeply concern the education and life of youth as protagonists of the changes taking place. Thus, the possibility for them to approach public space as a common good, in favour of social inclusion, can foster new interpretations of urban contexts of increasing complexity (cf. Biffi, 2023).

The contribution proposes a pedagogical reflection on the city as context and educational subject, starting from the valorisation of cultural places as spaces of relationships for youth. It concerns two research projects that investigating the topic from different perspectives, starting from a common interest in art-based and participatory approaches, and visual methods. The international Project “CommUnity - Build CommUnity Create Peace!”, with its “Harmony CommUnity” campaign, developed the theme of intercultural dialogue through the creation of communities of young people sharing a passion for the arts and music. The participatory video-research workshop “The City in Three Minutes”, instead, involved students from the Universities of Florence and Seville to bring out their vision regarding the city they inhabit.

In the first case, a group of seven students from the University of Florence, under the supervision of the research team RESILIENT coordinated by Prof. R. Biagioli, realised a musical and theatrical video performance in the city’s historic center. The subject addresses public space as place for intercultural dialogue between peoples, through the implementation of methodological art-based approaches and design thinking (Brown, 2008).

In the second case, the empirical research, ‘in progress’, considers the possibility that participatory research experiences, oriented at narrating the places of the city, promote lifelong learning and the interest of young people to public space. For this reason, the aim of the "The City in Three Minutes" project is to map the urban places narrated by the students in order to highlight the points of strength and the issues of weakness of the town itself. In addition, the workshop refers to the need to stimulate in young people a critical view of life contexts to foster awareness of their own reality as a first possibility to act on it (Freire, 2014 [1996]).

From a methodological point of view, the Video-Research Workshop is based on the Video-Voice research strategy (Gola, 2021), which adopts the strengths of the Photo-Voice method (Wang, Burris 1997) and incorporates video and digital audio technology.

Both investigative experiences reveal the importance of having young people exercise their observation and storytelling skills through images, to enhance their point of view on the theme of the transformations taking place in the city. This perspective also relates to the SDGs of the 2030 Agenda (UN) and the 'learning cities' model (Longwort, 2006; Boffo, Biagioli, 2023; Osborne, Piazza, 2023).