Survival in the badlands: An exploration of disaffected students’ uses of space in a UK secondary school
Ralph, T; Levinson, M
Date: 14 August 2019
Journal
British Journal of Sociology of Education
Publisher
Taylor & Francis (Routledge)
Publisher DOI
Abstract
This article considers the understandings of space and place amongst a group of
disaffected students, within an institution that had been in a state of flux over a
number of years. It explores ways in which students are positioned by institutions
into specific spaces, ways in which they use those spaces to challenge authority,
...
This article considers the understandings of space and place amongst a group of
disaffected students, within an institution that had been in a state of flux over a
number of years. It explores ways in which students are positioned by institutions
into specific spaces, ways in which they use those spaces to challenge authority,
and ways in which they appropriate both space and place to assert new, and often
playful, identities.
The authors consider the meanings of the spatial behaviour of students through
notions of space and place as developed by Doreen Massey, with reference to a
Foucauldian understanding of power. In some ways the students might be
perceived as being marginalised, victims of a hierarchical environment in which
their status is low. Yet they also emerge as active agents, forging new
interpretations of their surroundings, robust group identities, and reinforcing ingroup relationships through spatial behaviour.
School of Education
Faculty of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences
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