‘Generation Z under the X-ray’

Global and local, supportive and contentious, hyperconnected and interdependent, the Social Natives confuse us.

They were born between 1995 and 2005. They are caricatured with a cell phone in their hand. Who are the young people of Generation Z really? How do they differ from their elders?

Understanding the behaviors, representations and expectations of these young people who challenge and shake up the thought patterns and postures of previous generations is a necessity if we are not to miss the engagement with the world as it is becoming.

Elisabeth Soulié starts from the discourse of generation Z to conceptualize and produce a concrete content that can be mobilized within the family, the school or the company. As an anthropologist and coach, she has developed her expertise on Generation Z with young people from different social, economic and cultural backgrounds, evolving in various school, university and professional contexts in Paris and its suburbs. Her knowledge and fieldwork led her to publish a book entitled "La génération Z aux rayons X" (2020 ed. du Cerf).

Psychiatrist and psychotherapist, Bernard Fourez proposes a reading of what can constitute "the breakdown" in the young adult at the time of building his life project. He will show us how the "Z culture" induces a feeling of individual identity that is mainly based on self-expression and that constantly requires the gaze of the other, sometimes to the detriment of a posture of interiority and an ability to project oneself into the future.