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Paper short abstract

In this paper, I examine how anticipation for stable futures is intergenerationally shaped, making stability a key ‘return’ in encouraging educational migration of young women in the volatile region of Northeast India.

Paper long abstract

This paper examines how stability becomes a key desire for both parents and young students in the context of seeking higher education in the militarised region of Northeast India. Based on my doctoral fieldwork among university students in Assam, I argue that the desirability of secure employment among young women is intergenerationally shaped, reflecting a broader, collective anticipation for stable futures. Here, parents play a key role as actors from the preceding generation, which witnessed the peak of sovereignty movements, anti-insurgency operations, and consequent political turmoil and economic stagnation in the region. They, therefore, encourage educational migration for their children, including emphasising prolonged stay in larger cities to build a better, more stable, and less disruptive future and consider public sector employment as the ideal pathway to meet their desire for stability. This desire of the parents aligns with the aspirations of the young women to be economically independent through acquiring government jobs once they graduate. This aspiration is tied to women’s desire to meet their own financial needs while simultaneously providing monetary support to their parents. Here, I demonstrate how acquiring a postgraduate degree and a government job among women students need not be viewed solely through the lens of middle-class aspirations for job security or fulfilling family obligations. I foreground the context of a volatile region in shaping generational anticipation for a stable future amid economic and political precarity.