Coming of age on the edge of town: Perspectives in growing up in a rural trailer park

Abstract

The study of the transition to adulthood has emerged as a hot topic research area as an increasing amount of scholarship considers pathways experienced by young people as they come of age. While much of this research has focused on urban and suburban populations, we have seen little attention paid of the experiences of rural youth. This analysis makes use of ethnographic data collected over the course of two decades in rural mobile home park. These data provide a unique opportunity to examine how that developmental context is experienced by young people as they transition to adulthood using a long range rather than point in time view of development.