Open Research Online Oro.Open.Ac.Uk
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Open Research Online The Open University’s repository of research publications and other research outputs Threads Of Everyday Violence: Childhood In An Urdu-Speaking Bihari Camp In Bangladesh Thesis How to cite: Afroze, Jiniya (2019). Threads Of Everyday Violence: Childhood In An Urdu-Speaking Bihari Camp In Bangladesh. PhD thesis The Open University. For guidance on citations see FAQs. c 2019 The Author Version: Version of Record Copyright and Moral Rights for the articles on this site are retained by the individual authors and/or other copyright owners. For more information on Open Research Online’s data policy on reuse of materials please consult the policies page. oro.open.ac.uk Threads of everyday violence: Childhood in an Urdu-speaking Bihari camp in Bangladesh Jiniya Afroze A thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Childhood Studies Faculty of Wellbeing, Education and Language Studies The Open University May 2019 Declaration I declare that this thesis is my original work and any references are duly acknowledged. The publication that came out of this work: Afroze, J. (2019) ‘Realising childhood in an Urdu-speaking Bihari community in Bangladesh’, in von Benzon, N. and Wilkinson, C. (eds) Intersectionality and Difference in Childhood and Youth: Global Perspectives. London: Routledge, pp. 158-172. 2 Abstract This thesis explores children’s everyday experiences in an Urdu-speaking Bihari camp in Dhaka, Bangladesh. As members of the Bihari community, children and adults living in the camp are historically, ethnically, linguistically, and structurally marginalised. Examining the everyday lives of children and adults in a camp, this research illustrates how the concept of everyday violence plays out in children’s lives, and how children negotiate their agency in responding to everyday violence. Studies of children’s experiences of everyday violence and their agency in responding to it are still nascent in the field of Childhood Studies. Taking on board some of the contemporary discussions from the field relating to relational agency (Spyrou, 2018, 2019; Spyrou, Rosen and Cook, 2018; Abebe, 2019; Prout, 2019) and everyday violence (Scheper- Hughes and Bourgois, 2004b; Wells et al., 2014; Maternowska et al., 2018; Pells et al., 2018), this thesis aims to contribute to this emerging body of literature by bringing out a nuanced understanding of children’s experiences of everyday violence and their negotiation of agency in relation to power in spaces, gender, and generation. Embracing an ethnographic approach, data was collected between April and November 2016, using a combination of participant observation, interviews, and discussions with 78 children and 54 adults in a Bihari camp. The thesis argues that central to discourses around the construction of childhood in the camp are ideas about the ‘good’ and ‘rotten’ child, which are closely linked to the concept of good/rotten spaces. Children’s use of spaces, aspirations for education and work, and responses to cultural norms/practices, therefore, intertwine with ideas about respectability which define, shape, and influence children’s experiences of everyday violence. While children’s opportunities are often compromised and constrained in relation to everyday power dynamics, children constantly contest and negotiate relationships of power. Overall, the subtlety and complexity of children’s experiences demand a more nuanced exploration of children’s social spaces (e.g. home, camp, streets, school, workplace), as well as the socio-structural factors (e.g. poverty, power relations/dynamics in gender and generation) which shape their lives in order to fully understand how experiences of everyday violence are threaded through the mundane social practices and minutiae of children’s everyday lives. 3 Acknowledgements My deepest gratitude goes to the children and the adults who participated in this research. Thank you for sharing your time, space, and insights with me. I have learned so many things from each one of you – and I am ever so grateful to you for that. I am thankful to my former colleagues who linked me to the gatekeeper NGO in Bangladesh providing me the initial access to the research site. I am grateful to the executive director and all the staffs of the NGO for their warmth and generous support during my time in the field. My heartfelt thanks go to my supervisory team: Dr. Heather Montgomery and Dr. Mimi Tatlow-Golden. I am indebted to you, Heather, for your critical insights, profound enthusiasm, and unfailing support throughout. It has been an immensely rewarding and liberating experience for me to work with you. I have learned so much from you which opened, challenged, and deepened my understanding at various levels. I hope I can reflect some of that through my work. I am extremely grateful to you, Mimi, for joining the team in the writing-up stage, and providing relentless support thereafter. Your critical insights and numerous questions challenged me and helped to get clarity in my thinking for which I am deeply thankful to you. I am grateful to The Open University, UK for fully funding this research and making this project possible. I am thankful to Dr. Tim Lewis and Dr. Lindsay O’Dell for being so compassionate and supportive during their roles as Directors of Postgraduate Studies. Thanks to Anne Foward at the student administration office for being a firm support. My Ph.D. colleagues have been a strong source of inspiration – I thank you all for sharing laughter, food, coffee and walk in the lovely campus in Milton Keynes. I am grateful to my wonderful family and friends for their unconditional love and care. Abbu and Ammu, thank you for the amazing parents that you are, and for allowing me to be the person that I am today. Thanks also to my sisters for all your love. Thanks to Hasan for being my consistent confidante as we hiked towards our Ph.D. ventures together. A big thanks to our son Audri, for helping me to learn to pause, to breathe, to laugh, and to feel ‘it is okay’ even when things do not fall into places. Your curiosity about mummy’s work with children has been an immense source of inspiration. 4 Table of Contents Declaration __________________________________________________ 2 Abstract _____________________________________________________ 3 Acknowledgements ___________________________________________ 4 Preface _____________________________________________________ 11 1 Chapter One: Understanding childhood and everyday violence __ 17 1.1 Introduction _______________________________________________ 17 1.2 Conceptualising everyday violence ____________________________ 17 1.2.1 Everyday violence in everyday lives _______________________________ 20 1.3 Conceptualising children’s agency ____________________________ 25 1.3.1 Relational understanding of children’s agency _______________________ 27 1.3.2 Relational agency and power: gender, generation, and spaces __________ 28 1.4 Childhood, everyday violence and child protection in Bangladesh __ 33 1.4.1 Contextualising ‘childhood’ in Bangladesh __________________________ 34 1.4.2 Childhood, gender norms and cultural practices ______________________ 35 1.4.3 Childhood and generational relationships in Bangladesh _______________ 37 1.4.4 Childhood in urban slums in Bangladesh ___________________________ 40 1.4.5 Contested notions of children’s education and work ___________________ 41 1.5 Summary _________________________________________________ 43 2 Chapter Two: Research context _____________________________ 44 2.1 Introduction _______________________________________________ 44 2.2 Negotiating access to the field ________________________________ 44 2.3 Historical overview: Urdu-speaking Biharis in Bangladesh ________ 45 2.4 The research context – an Urdu-speaking Bihari camp in Bangladesh 48 2.4.1 Getting to ‘know’ the camp ______________________________________ 50 2.5 Summary _________________________________________________ 60 3 Chapter Three: Research methods __________________________ 61 3.1 Introduction _______________________________________________ 61 5 3.2 Research with children – ethics, methods, and reflexivity _________ 61 3.3 An ethnographic research approach ___________________________ 64 3.4 Reflexivity and the research site ______________________________ 65 3.5 Selecting participants _______________________________________ 71 3.6 Methods used _____________________________________________ 76 3.6.1 Participant observation __________________________________________ 76 3.6.2 Interviews ____________________________________________________ 79 3.6.3 Group Discussions _____________________________________________ 83 3.7 Transcriptions and translations _______________________________ 85 3.8 Data analysis ______________________________________________ 87 3.9 Summary _________________________________________________ 90 4 Chapter Four: Socio-spatial dynamics of everyday violence ______ 91 4.1 Introduction _______________________________________________ 91 4.2 Becoming ‘rotten’ vs. being ‘good’ ____________________________ 91 4.3 Experiencing everyday violence within a socio-spatial context ____ 100 4.4 Spaces, relations, and power: negotiating everyday violence _____ 105 4.4.1 Everyday violence in the private space – the home ___________________ 105 4.4.2 Everyday violence in the public space – the camp ____________________ 108 4.5 Summary ________________________________________________ 114 5 Chapter Five: Everyday violence intertwined with children’s work and education ______________________________________________