A University of Sussex PhD thesis Available online via Sussex Research Online: http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/ This thesis is protected by copyright which belongs to the author. This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the Author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the Author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given Please visit Sussex Research Online for more information and further details Located lives: An ethnographic representation of people and place on a British council estate Sarah Leaney Thesis submitted for PhD examination University of Sussex May 2016 2 Acknowledgements This thesis is the product of thinking with others. I feel privileged to be surrounded by people who teach me so much and listen to me as though I have something to say. I would like to thank Máiréad and Valerie for engaging in this work. For being generous in thinking through questions that I know we all continue to struggle with, and for being patient when I felt so uncomfortable trying to articulate any answers. Our supervision meetings were always inspiring; trying to keep up with the two of you encouraged me more than anything. Thanks to all my friends at Sussex who have been there for me, I actually couldn’t have done it without you: Rebecca, Francesca, Gill, Emily, Gemma, Jess, Louise, Ann, Elsie and David. Thank you to all my family for helping me to try my best. To my Dad who always tells me to question and my Mum who reminds me how important it is to listen. Most importantly, thank you to the people who allowed me into their lives throughout this research. I hope that your kindness and humour is not lost in this thesis, it is the defining feature of our friendships. 3 Summary UNIVERSITY OF SUSSEX Sarah Leaney Located lives: an ethnographic representation of people and place on a British council estate This thesis is the product of ethnographic research conducted over a period of eighteen months on a council estate, located on the outskirts of a city in Britain. The research explores how the everyday lives of people on The Estate are shaped by their being there. It also examines the material and social conditions, which produce and legitimate knowledges of these people and this place. A central concern of the research is the exploration of classed identity formations. Conducted in ‘austerity Britain’ it traces the material and social constitution of the council estate at a moment of heightened interest (popular, political and academic) as ‘other’. The thesis aims to develop a theorisation of being placed on the council estate, which maintains sensitivity to the objectifying processes of claiming to know: specifically, a political commitment to representations of ideas of difference and dissensus (Rancière, 1998; 2006). This work is produced in conversation with class theory; inspired by Bourdieu’s linking of objective structures to subjective experience (Bourdieu, 1977; 1980; 1983) and feminist reflexive writings of the affective in classed beings (Hey, 2006; Walkerdine, 2010; Lucey, 2010). However, crucially, it does not produce a new categorisation of class. Rather I begin from a premise that ‘identity categories are never merely descriptive, but always normative, and as such, exclusionary’ (Butler, 1992: 15-16). In this thesis, I work through a deconstruction of the concepts of class in order to ‘continue to use them, repeat them, to repeat them subversively, and to displace them from the contexts in which they have been deployed as instruments of oppressive power’ (1992: 17). This work is located within academic debates around identity. Thinking with post-structural conceptualisations of gender (Butler, 1990) and race (Nayak, 1977), I develop these as a way to think class. I build upon conceptualisations of habitus (Bourdieu, 2005) as a starting point for exploring subjectivities. Drawing upon work foregrounding the affective consequences of shifts in circumstances resulting in a habitus ‘out of place’ (Reay, 2007); I explore the moments of negotiation that occur when one is ‘in place’. 4 Furthering a theorisation of class as a social placing, I bring in conceptual developments within social geography to explore the social constitution of classed places (Massey, 2005; Featherstone, 2013). Through my conceptualisation of ‘being place(d)’ I posit identity formation and place making as intertwined processes. Consequently, identity formation through processes of being place(d) on The Estate is not a simple process of socialisation where one learns to be through being of a particular place; rather it is the positioning in place through being in moments of difference. Through my analysis, I theorise identity as moments of identification (Hall, 1996), within which aspects of self are formed in proximity and/or distanced with others. This conceptualisation of relational identity construction is heavily influenced by Bourdieu’s thinking, yet moves beyond habitus as ‘forgotten history’ (Bourdieu, 1990: 56) to habitus as ‘foregrounded history’. Finally, I bring my range of theoretical resources together in my analysis of a Community Centre as a ‘contact zone’ - a social space where ‘cultures meet, clash, and grapple with each other, often in contexts of highly asymmetrical relations of power’ (Pratt, 1991: 34). These momentary exposures do not occur in isolation and are entangled within histories and processes of domination that reach far beyond the moment of contact. Consequently, analysis of this interaction requires bifocality - at once interested in the moment of construction, whilst exploring the contexts within which this moment is located and thus interpreted. In so doing, I highlight the importance of power in the maintenance of structures, whilst allowing the possibility of subversion and resistance within moments of contact. 5 Contents Chapter 1: Introduction .............................................................................................................. 9 Section 1: Introducing the research ................................................................................................ 9 Research temporalities ............................................................................................................ 10 A time, a place?....................................................................................................................... 10 ‘Austerity’ and the visibility of class ...................................................................................... 12 Common sense as political struggle: possibilities for change ................................................. 14 Section 2: Core debates - towards questioning ............................................................................ 15 Truth telling: Legitimation through authenticity .................................................................... 15 Reflexivity: performing position ............................................................................................. 19 From seeking to know to embracing wonder .......................................................................... 20 Structure and agency in post-structural thought: challenging the autonomous subject .......... 21 Locating the subject: post-structural theorisations of identity ................................................ 23 Chapter 2: Constructing context .............................................................................................. 25 Introduction .................................................................................................................................. 25 Section 1: Fictionalising The Estate............................................................................................. 26 Histories and geographies of The Estate ................................................................................. 28 Storying the statistics .............................................................................................................. 30 The right to home .................................................................................................................... 33 Section 2: Estate services ............................................................................................................. 34 Space for community .............................................................................................................. 35 A failing market: educational provision on The Estate ........................................................... 36 Section 3: The Estate, a class in itself .......................................................................................... 40 Chapter 3: Theorising The Estate: the concepts of class and community ............................ 43 Introduction .................................................................................................................................. 43 Section 1: Theorising class - from structure to post-structure ..................................................... 43 Beyond or between? Structure and agency in class theory ..................................................... 44 Mapping structure, tracing capitals ......................................................................................... 47 Bourdieu and British class culture: a perfect fit? ...................................................................