Episode
Ground Level: Ageing and Care w/ Yingzi Shen
- Podcast
- SPERI Presents...
- Published
- Mar 9, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 2872
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- https://shows.acast.com/speri-presents/episodes/ground-level-ageing-and-care-w-yingzi-shen
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Summary
Supporting the most vulnerable, including children and the elderly, is one of the main forms of caring labour for social reproduction. The moral and economic choices individuals and families make every day when dealing with children, as well as old age, have broad implications for the global political economy of care. These decisions unfold within a context where populations in wealthy economies are ageing, while birth rates are rising in many postcolonial societies. This demographic divergence contributes to the (re)production and entrenchment of gendered and racialised hierarchies. Yet, children and the elderly are not only passive subjects or caring. They often become active carers and central agents of social reproduction labour. Today’s episode will centre on this more agential role of vulnerable populations by exploring the contribution of grandparents’ caring role to the formal labour economy. Concepts discussed: social reproduction, care labour, urban/rural divide. Hosted by: Dr Frank Maracchione , SOAS University of London. Speakers: Dr Yingzi Shen recently completed her PhD at the School of Sociological Studies, Politics and International Relations, University of Sheffield. Her PhD research looked at the intergenerational cooperation in childcare in rural-to-urban migrant families in China and how it is affected by rural migrants' limited access to welfare and social inequalities. Her research interests lie broadly in the nexus between care and migration, as well as ageing, family studies, and rural-urban inequalities. Reading list: Chan, K. W., Cai, F., Wan, G., & Wang, M. (2019) Urbanization with Chinese characteristics: the Hukou system and migration . London: Routledge. Liang, J., Huang, W., &…