Context matters: design and demographics

Chapter 3 emphasises that context matters when exploring migratory patterns. First, we focus on demographic and industrial evolutions and outline ways in which creative industries are important for a city’s development. We then discuss the importance of changes in the provision of art education nationally and locally before focusing on a city’s cultural strategy and the development of that place’s cultural and creative industries. Finally, we reflect on other aspects of a place, including housing costs, levels of educational attainment, youth unemployment, and racial and class inequalities. As the importance of context evolves over time, we emphasise that research should investigate migration and occupation trajectories over workers’ lifespans and within historical contexts. We use this chapter to justify our approach of gathering life-course accounts from three separate generational groups: Baby Boomers (born between 1945 and 1965), Generation X (born between 1966 and 1981), and Millennials (born between 1982 and 2000).