Moving Histories Of Class And Community

Features

Description

White working class areas are often seen as entrenched and immobile, threatened by the arrival of newcomers, especially foreigners and people of colour. This major new study of white working class Britain since 1930 challenges accepted wisdom to provide a completely different perspective, showing how relatively small moves - as well as longer distance migration, including emigration - are suffused with emotion and can play a major role in influencing ideas of place and belonging.

Based around the case study of three social housing estates in Norwich, England, over a seventy year period, and with oral histories at its heart, it also tells stories of the appropriation and resistance of state discourses of community, and of the ambivalent, complex and shifting set of class relations and identities.

Material poverty has been a constant in the area throughout the period covered, but not for all residents, and being defined as 'poor' is an identity that is actively resisted.

Review:

'I will certainly be adding the book to reading lists' - Sue Child, Times Higher Education 'endlessly interesting...and important work' - Lynsey Hanley, author of Estates: An Intimate History 'This book challenges contemporary stereotypes about the identity of the white working class in England ...

Rogaly and Taylor question the customary opposition between immigrants and rooted local populations, demonstrating the mobility of 'local people' and the constantly changing identity of 'the community' over time ... This is a fascinating and important study.' - Robert J. C. Young, Julius Silver Professor of English and Comparative Literature, New York University, USA 'If you want to know how class 'feels' this book offers a nuanced understanding!Written with clarity by a geographer and an historian it charts lives stretched out over time and space ...

This is a unique and important contribution to the recently revitalised area of class analysis.' - Professor Beverley Skeggs, Goldsmiths, University of London, UK 'Drawing upon personal testimony, archival evidence and participant observation, this intimate account of a working class housing estate!approach[es] the emotionality and significance of the residents' own 'moving' stories with great insight and sensitivity.' - Professor Alistair Thomson, Monash University, Australia 'Rogaly and Taylor make clear in this book not only how, but especially where, class is lived.

Moving Histories is a vital addition to the burgeoning New Working Class Studies movement.' - Don Mitchell, Distinguished Professor of Geography, Syracuse University, USA '... the detailed qualitative data provide a rich account of resident experiences and offer an important contribution in questioning cultual stereotypes.

In particular, the book has considerable value in giving voice to communities that are paid lip service, but largely neglected in academic discussion and practical policy. The positioning of debates about identity within the realm of class-based analysis is clearly worthwhile and overall the authord manage to provide a thought-provoking, well-written and at times 'moving' analysis of living in contemporary social housing.' - Tony Manzi, University of Westminster, UK 'Without compromising on the complexity of their material, or exhausting the interpretive options, the authors have succeeded in placing a form of order on these jagged narratives.

If you are trying to understand how class is enacted (with a historical and place-based dimension) in contemporary provincial England, then this rich and challenging text should be a starting point.' - Political Geography 'This book...offers a welcome and refreshing antidote to the pathologisation and criminalisation of social problems evident in much present-day political and academic discourse.' - Social Policy & Administration