Struggling At The Margins – Youth, Racial Tension And Informal Educational Responses

Author(s):

Paul Thomas(submitting)Peter Sanderson(presenting)

Conference:

ECER 2012

Network:

07. Social Justice and Intercultural Education

Format:

Paper

Session Information

07 SES 01 A, Intercultural Learning in Nonformal Education

Parallel Paper Session

Time:

2012-09-18

13:15-14:45

Room:

ESI 3 - Aula 4

Chair:

Yvonne Leeman

Contribution

Instances of significant ethnic segregation, racial tension and mutual feelings of persecution, and attempts to promote social justice amongst young people of different ethnic backgrounds, have become increasingly salient in Europe since 2001. Researchers have identified a pan-European trend towards policies emphasising assimilation at the expense of legitimised diversity (Vasta, 2007; Back et al., 2002). This trend is in part grounded in unease about the impact of religious and cultural diversity on social cohesion and trust in neighbourhood relations (Cantle, 2005; Dekker & Bolt, 2005; Lancee & Dronkers, 2011). This paper draws on research conducted in Oldham and Rochdale (located in the Greater Manchester area of the UK) to explore the theoretical basis for understanding the spatial realisation of complex global and local networks in terms of geographies of marginality and exclusion (Mohan, 2002; Massey, 2004).

Following this exploration, we analyse ways in which youth workers/informal educators respond to the challenge of the ‘marginal’: marginal in the sense that Oldham and Rochdale are peripheral, ex-industrial satellite towns left behind by the neo-liberal re-structuring of globalisation (Amin, 2002), so producing a situation of marginalized youth excluded from the economic and social mainstream. This classed experience of marginality has been significantly racialised through ethnic segregation in residence and the consumption of public services. The paper suggests that marginal education professionals, youth workers and other informal educators have been at the forefront of attempts to address this racialised, and often violent, youth marginality. The educational approach taken in this situation of marginality, can be characterised as representative of recent UK policy shifts towards ‘cohesion’ and ‘integration’ identified above. Such shifts have been seen as reinforcing asymmetric power relations within UK society (Back et al, 2002), but we suggest that this research evidence from educational practice in situations of marginality suggests the potential for more progressive praxis.

Method

The empirical research on which the paper is based was conducted over the past decade in the Greater Manchester area. Methods include in-depth qualitative interviews with youth workers who reflected on their changed professional practice in relation to this reality of ethnic segregation and ethnic tension and action research in partnership with local marginalised education professionals working with the most economically marginalized or ‘socially excluded’ youth. Specific techniques in the latter element included questionnaires with 3-point scale responses, and Identity ranking’ exercise that asked young people to rank the identifications of most importance to them, individual and group interviews and word association exercises. The research process drew on over 150 marginalised young people drawn from 15 youth projects/centres consisting of white or South Asian Muslim origin young people from predominantly mono-cultural areas. The analysis, which explored the relationship between experience of place, identification of self and categorization of others, and the impact of informal education interventions, was shared with local policy makers and practitioners, and so with the young people they work with.

Expected Outcomes

The research showed a shift in youth work professional practice away from approaches supporting diversity and separate provision towards active attempts to facilitate cohesion and intercultural education amongst marginalised and mutually-antagonistic youth. This work, built around informal and experiential educational approaches, rather than the didactic approaches or ‘anti-racist’ education previously favoured, have been based on ‘contact theory’ (Amir, 1998). This approach, focuses on how educators can create safe spaces whereby young people can start to engage in cross-ethnic relationship-building and dialogue, and so start to question their own assumptions precisely because their own (socially marginalised) identity is not perceived to be under threat or criticism through the educational process. The research evidence from young people showed the need for such educational practice, with significantly prejudiced views of the ‘other’, with each ‘racial’ group viewing the other as more powerful, and highly-racialised sense of safe and unsafe ‘space’.

References

Amir, Y. (1998) ‘Contact Hypothesis in Ethnic Relations’, in The Handbook of Interethnic Coexistence, W Weiner (ed), New York: Continuum, pp 162-81. Amin, A. (2002) ‘Ethnicity and the multi-cultural city: living with diversity’, Environment and Planning, 34: 959-980. Back, L; Keith, M; Khan, A; Shukra, K & Solomos, J (2002) ‘New Labour’s white heart: politics, multiculturalism and the return of assimilation’, Political Quarterly, 73 (4), 445-54. Cantle, T. (2005) Community cohesion: A new Framework for Race Relations, Basingstoke; Palgrave Dekker, K and Bolt, G (2005) ‘Social Cohesion in Post-war Estates in the Netherlands: Differences between socio-economic groups’ Urban Studies,42(13) 2447-2470. Lancee, B & Dronkers, J (2011) ‘Ethnic, Religious and Economic Diversity in Dutch Neighbourhoods: explaining quality of contact with neighbours, trust in the neighbourhood and Inter-Ethnic trust’, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 37 (4), 597-618. Massey, D (2004) ‘Geographies of Responsibility’, Geografiska Annaler, 86B: 5-18. Mohan, J (2002) ‘Geographies of welfare and social exclusion: Dimensions, consequences and methods’, Progress in Human Geography, 26 (1) 65-75. Vasta, E (2007) ‘From ethnic minorities to ethnic majority policy: Multiculturalism and the shift to assimilationism in the Netherlands’, Ethnic and Racial Studies, 30(5), 713-740

Author Information

Paul Thomas (submitting)

University of Huddersfield

School of Education and Professional Development

Huddersfield

Peter Sanderson (presenting)

Huddersfield University

Education and Community Studies