Hello Transgangers!

It seems like it was yesterday when our project began, and we are already entering the final stretch. Actually, TRANSGANG was supposed to end in December 2022, but due to COVID it has been extended until June 30, 2023. Luckily, the fieldwork has been successfully completed, so I thank you all for your commitment and good work. The transfer activities are pending, including publications and especially the final congress, scheduled to be held in Barcelona from May 15 to 17, 2023, in which I hope we can all meet, whose program we have just published on the project website (here).

The year 2022 began with several tragic events for the theme of the project: in February there were two murders in Madrid linked to the so-called "Latin gangs", with subsequent vendettas and a strong police deployment, which affected our work; in March, a "state of alarm" was declared in El Salvador, initiating a bloody "war against gangs" that still lasts; and in the Maghreb countries the socio-political situation has worsened, negatively affecting street youth. In addition to finishing the fieldwork, the last year has involved the completion of the three documentaries we have produced, in Barcelona, Rabat and Medellín, with the participation of local researchers and young participants: we are very satisfied with the result, which we plan to premiere during the May congress (here). As for the publications, we must highlight the completion of the Working Papers and the monographs of the journals Youth and Globalization and the Latin American Journal of Social Sciences, Children and Youth, in which some of you have participated (here).

Next year 2023, as I said, will focus on regional and transnational analysis, in which the ethnographic coordinators are involved, as well as on the publication of the final reports. From May 15 to 17 we will meet in Barcelona, to present the main Outcomes of the project, premiere the documentaries and discuss the results with researchers and social agents. From May 17 to 20, a Workshop is planned in a monastery outside Barcelona, co-organized with the EUROGANG network, to which everyone is also invited to contribute with local studies, although it is not directly part of TRANSGANG (call for papers here). In another email we will sent a Google Form to book your travel and stance. Finally, our intention is to be able to publish two collective books as the final results of the study: a book in English that we are negotiating with an important publisher, and a book in Spanish with a selection of life stories, which you are already elaborating.

As I have recently been to Bethlehem (Palestine), I take these days to wish you a happy start to the new year, with all my best wishes for peace and happiness.

Carles Feixa

TRANSGANG PI