How participants judge residents in other neighbourhoods

How participants judge residents in other neighbourhoods

Many of the participants felt that they ought not to make judgements on where people lived. For some, this was potentially because they did not want others to judge them on where they lived – especially for residents in hard pressed areas. For others, there was considerable awareness that even for people who can choose where they live, socioeconomic circumstances may limit, to an extent, the choices they are able to make. Further, and as with any number of other discussion points, what one person saw as a positive neighbourhood attribute would be dismissed out of hand by others as a negative attribute of the same neighbourhood.

Laura, Pilot Group

It was reassuring within the focus group dynamic that despite so many people thinking they ought not to express judgements about others’ neighbourhoods, they then went on to do so. Firstly, it ensured a degree of lively debate about different neighbourhood characteristics, but secondly, and more importantly, it suggested to me that, although people had a sophisticated understanding and awareness of prevailing social mores, and the unfashionableness of stereotyping, they were willing to enter into these discussions quite willingly. I felt that this boded well for asking them to talk, later in the group, about attitudes towards the fire service, both as emblematic of what people in their neighbourhood (or indeed, other neighbourhoods) might think, and also in the knowledge that, although one ought not to speak badly of a public service, they were clearly prepared to do so.

Making judgements about their own neighbourhood

Steve, Hilton HFSV

In this quote, Steve is attempting to explore the way in which I chose my study neighbourhoods. Indeed, the three neighbourhoods I chose are generally considered to be ‘rough’, although in different ways, and certainly, Hilton would be seen as the least rough. Further, they are not the only neighbourhoods in Bristol that could be seen this way, rather they typify some white working class peripheral neighbourhoods, and not the more diverse, inner city urban areas that are potentially more renowned outside Bristol. With a degree of inverse snobbery, some people are proud to live in an area with a reputation, or accepting of the good aspects, as discussed above, which make up for less favourable aspects of their residential experience.

For other residents, the constant belittling of the neighbourhood, and its division into more or less amenable microgeographies was a matter of concern and distaste:

Liz, Upperfield

Liz is well aware of the divisions in her neighbourhood, which is divided into ‘old’ and ‘new’ estate (reflecting one build pre WW2 and one built immediately after). To those in Upperfield, the ‘old’ estate is popularly portrayed as ‘rough’ and the ‘new’ estate as ‘posh’. To many outside Upperfield, the whole area is one best avoided. She does not want to buy into and perpetuate the distinctions that make one part of her area seem better than the other part, preferring to speak positively of the whole area. Similarly, a participant in a different focus group took umbrage at people discussing the negative aspects of their estate, asking participants to remember ‘happy Shiregreen’ instead. This will be discussed in greater detail in the self esteem section, below. Similar distinctions were also made about my neighbourhood, with the assumption:

You’re a student, you don’t have any choice

Al, Hilton

This demonstrates a number of points. There is an assumption here that I would not choose to live, perhaps as he had not chosen to live, in the neighbourhood in which I do live. This is actually untrue, and suggests an interesting point, that it is acceptable to live somewhere like Abbeyville, or by extension, any of the other neighbourhoods in the study, if you do not choose to. However, choosing to live there is somehow suspicious. It also reinforces the earlier point about challenging the power relations in the group so that, in this group at least, I became positioned as a ‘poor student’ rather than an ‘all powerful’ moderator. In other groups, this was also picked up outside the formal discussion, when I came to reimburse people. A number of participants said, in the nicest possible way, that I needed the money more than they did. When I insisted it came from university budgets, and that they’d ‘earned’ it, they would reluctantly take it from me, saying that they would give it to charity³. Where people have not chosen to live where they live, they make assumptions that other people also lack choice or control, and as such, judge people in the way that they see themselves and judge their own lives.

Self esteem

Leanne, Shiregreen

In this instance, the young woman says that, when people hear she lives in Shiregreen, they assume she is a drug addict. Other residents in this and other groups used similar derogatory words, such as ‘scabby’ and ‘junky’. Many of the participants appeared to put quite brave faces on these types of remarks, almost revelling in the negative connotations, and appearing to brazen them out. This appears to a be a rational ‘survival strategy’ for living in such a neighbourhood (Mathers, Parry et al. 2008). However, amongst older residents, whilst the knowledge of the stereotype remained the same, there was more of a sense of resignation and sadness, particularly amongst those who were parents themselves, and did not want their children to grow up affected by both the problems and the reputations.

Sometimes you get people who are really nice and polite, and they’ll talk to anyone, but other times you get something different

Sarah, Shiregreen

In this quote, Sarah suggests that for someone to talk to her, once she’s said she lives in Shiregreen, they have to be ‘nice and polite’. This suggests that she thinks there is something wrong with living in Shiregreen, and by association, something wrong with her. Such associations perhaps make it increasingly less likely that people from these areas either leave, in case they are judged for where they are from, or if they do go off the estate, that they do not mix with people from other areas, perhaps feeling that they are not good enough to. As such, estate culture becomes increasingly ingrained, not just in response to the outside world, but in defence and defiance of it (Hanley 2007).