Intersectionality and Youth Work

Youth work is about understanding young people in the fullness of who they are. Intersectionality helps us do that by recognising how different parts of identity shape experience, opportunity, and exclusion.

In a nutshell intersectionality is a way of understanding the different parts of our identity and where they crossover. This has an impact on how we experience different situations and means that one individual’s experience of something can contradict the experience of someone else.

Not one person is just one thing or has just one thing that makes them who they are. The term ‘Intersectionality’ was coined in 1989 by Kimberle Crenshaw as a framework that shows how multiple social identities such as race, gender and class can overlap and interact to create unique experiences of discrimination and privilege. A good example are the different experiences of sexism.

Two young women may both experience sexism, but a Black young woman may also face racism at the same time. This can change how she is treated, how seriously she is listened to, and what support she needs, compared to a White young woman who experiences sexism without racial discrimination.

What does this have to do with youth work though?

‘If you don't have a lens that's been trained to look at how various forms of discrimination come together, you're unlikely to develop a set of policies that will be as inclusive as they need to be.’ Kimberle Crenshaw

If we don’t consider the intersectional identities of the young people we work with, how can we ensure that we are giving them the tools to make positive changes in their lives, communities and wider society?

Annette Coburn in her 2012 article in the Journal of Youth Studies ‘Building social and cultural capital through youth work’ argued that young work encourages thinking and action about equality and has three pillars that build intersectional practice;

1. Engage in conversation with young people – youth work uses problem-posing dialogue and conversation to raise awareness of historical and current forms of discrimination.

2. Self-reflection and helping young people to self reflect – youth work creates safe spaces where young people can explore how gender, culture, class, disability, or sexuality influence their values and experiences, rather than assuming a single, shared perspective.

3. Engage young people in informal education – youth work enhances the possibilities for collaborative learning between young people and youth workers that enables a positive view of young people to be made visible. This increases the possibility for a reconfiguration of the views and understandings of young people as integral to society.

This is something most youth workers will do naturally, none of the three pillars are new approaches in this sector. What we should be doing alongside our usual practice is building our understanding of our own intersectional identity through self-reflection to then better support young people. No two people will be impacted in the same way by the same experience, but if we can support a young person to understand their own intersectionality, we can better support them.

In delivering training in this area, I have had the experience of coming across a range of views on this topic. Some find our training very inciteful, we support participants to reflect on their own identities and how society has shaped their views, and it’s given them a great skill to use in their practice. However, some practitioners feel intersectionality is just the latest academic term. In reality, it gives language to something youth work has always recognised: young people’s experiences are shaped by overlapping factors, not single issues. We all experience different inequalities and all have different levels of privilege but these are impacted by the different identities we hold and how these have impacted our experience of society.

Visual tools like the privilege wheel help people reflect on where they hold power and where they may face barriers, without blame or shame. It shows that privilege is uneven, shifting, and often invisible until mapped. When we map ourselves on this wheel it won’t make a perfect circle but will likely go in and out. This gives a good visual image of how intersectional identities impact privilege but also inequality.

An understanding of intersectionality will help youth workers support a young person in their everyday lives but also when a particular situation has arisen or been experienced with them. We may expect a young person to react in a certain way but if the reaction is much bigger or smaller than we’d expect,  this is where we may be using our own life experience to understand. If we view it through an intersectional lens we are more likely to be able to support that young person by thinking of how their intersectional identity may be impacting this experience.

The Action on Prejudice toolkit ‘An Introduction to Intersectional Youth Work’ goes into more detail about Annette Coburn’s three pillars of youth work and how this can be embedded into practice. We are also running a training session in January 2026 which is open to youth workers or can provide bespoke sessions for youth work organisations if you would like to learn more.

Finally, one thing to remember is that: ‘having…privilege doesn’t mean your life was easy, it just means who you are hasn’t made it harder’. Intersectional identities impact every part of our lives and being able to understand this or at least be able to consider it can only improve youth work practice.

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