Apologies for cross posting. I am looking for just one more submission
within this panel. If anyone interested, can send me their abstract by
tomorrow morning.
Best wishes,
Vidya
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CALL FOR PAPERS: RGS-IBG Annual International Conference 2018, Cardiff,
28-31 August 2018
*Abstract submission deadline 15th Feb*
*From informal to formal housing: analysing interactions between space,
memory, and identity through lived experiences of the settlers *
Using place as an analytical construct, the session aims at
understanding lived experiences of the settlers. During the last few
decades, there has been an emphasis on assigning land titles and
homeownership to the poor (c.f. de Sotto, 2000). Despite shortcomings with
the tenure security argument (c.f. Mahadevia, 2010; Fernandes, 2002), a
growing shortages in housing for the poor and an availability of new forms
of external investments (Lemanski et. al., 2017) has resulted in a
proliferation of state-driven mass-housing programmes in the cities of the
global south (Croese et.al., 2016). In the context of these developments,
the session aims at discussing the interactions between space, identity and
memory. In particular, the session welcomes studies that investigate the
following questions.
1. *How meanings and practices are produced and consumed in space.* This
not only involves understanding creation of meanings in place, it also
necessitates understanding practices that do not conform to the
expectations of place i.e. the role of (formal) place in constructing moral
geographies (Cresswell, 1999). For instance, the role of repetitive mundane
every activity - everyday practices (de Certeau, 1984) - in creation of
meanings and that of *formal* housing in proliferation of certain
(middle-class) values (Ferguson and Gupta, 2002, p.989; Erwin, 2017, p.86)
has been widely discussed.
2. *How production of memories and places are inherently interlinked*.
For instance, certain feature of informal housing such as auto-construction
mechanism (Holston, 2008), social networks, participation, solidarity,
social trust, social control, and also the material conditions, are also
associated with individual and collective memories. Such memories, in turn,
affect how settlers experience the formal housing. Salcedo (2010),
Mosselson (2017), and Charlton and Meth (2017), among others, reveal
diverse narratives that represent both moments of change and possibility as
well as difficulty, inequality, and marginalisation with the formal
housing. Such narratives are shaped by the (current) use of place and by
(past) memories (Jones and Garde-Hansen, 2012).
3. *What role does place construction (and maintenance of boundaries)
plays in the creation of gendered identities*. For instance, Pratt’s
(1999) research with domestic workers criticises the notion of ‘home’ that
conveys an image of a peaceful and meaningful refuge by bringing in issues
of gendered experience and power relations at home. Similarly, Charlton and
Meth (2017), in their research on state housing in Johannesburg and Durban
bring out issues of domestic violence and intra-family violence.
4. *And lastly, how does place affects citizenship practices. *Formal
housing plays a significant role in shaping ideas of citizenship – through
state recognition, recognition of political parties and that of city
authorities. Salcedo (2010), and Charlton and Meth (2017), for instance,
share evidences of a politics of recognition in the state-subsidised
housing.
*References:*
1. Charlton, S. & Meth, P. (2017). Lived experiences of state housing in
Johannesburg and Durban. *Transformation: Critical Perspectives on
Southern Africa* 93(1), 91-115. Transformation. Retrieved February 6,
2018, from Project MUSE database.
1. Cresswell, T 1999, Place : A Short Introduction, John Wiley & Sons,
Incorporated, Chicester. Available from: ProQuest Ebook Central. [6
February 2018].
2. Croese, S, LR Cirolia and N Graham (2016) ‘Towards Habitat III:
confronting the disjuncture between global policy and local practice on
Africa’s “challenge of slums”’, Habitat International 53.
3. de Certeau, M., 1984. The Practice of Everyday Life, 1984th ed.
University of California Press, Berkley, Los Angeles and London.
1. De Soto, H (2000) The Mystery of Capital. New York: Basic Books.
2. Erwin, K. (2017). ‘You make a home out if it, you make a place of
it’: some unexpected narratives from a social housing estate in
Durban. *Transformation:
Critical Perspectives on Southern Africa* 93(1), 68-90. Transformation.
Retrieved February 6, 2018, from Project MUSE database.
3. Ferguson, J., Gupta, A., 2002. Spatializing States: Toward an
Ethnography of Neoliberal Governmentality. American Ethnologist 29,
981–1002.
1. Fernandes, E (2002) ‘The influence of de Soto’s The Mystery of
Capital’, Land Lines 14(1)
2. Jones, O., Garde-Hansen, J., Hansen, J.G.-, 2012. Geography and
memory : explorations in identity, place and becoming. Houndmills,
Basingstoke, Hampshire, Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire.
3. Lemanski, C. & Charlton, S. & Meth, P. "Living in state housing:
expectations, contradictions and consequences." *Transformation:
Critical Perspectives on Southern Africa*, vol. 93 no. 1, 2017, pp.
1-12. *Project MUSE*, doi:10.1353/trn.2017.0000
<http://doi.org/10.1353/trn.2017.0000>
4. Mahadevia, D. (2010), Tenure Security and Urban Social Protection
Links: India. IDS Bulletin, 41: 52–62. doi:10.1111/j.1759-5436.2010.0
0152.x
5. Mosselson, A. (2017). ‘It’s not a place I like, but I can live with
it’: ambiguous experiences of living in state-subsidised rental housing in
inner-city Johannesburg. *Transformation: Critical Perspectives on
Southern Africa*93(1), 142-169. Transformation. Retrieved February 6,
2018, from Project MUSE database.
1. Pratt (1999). Geographies of Identity and Difference: Marking
Boundaries in Massey, D., Allen, J. and Sarre, P. eds. Human Geography
Today Polity, Cambridge 151-168.
2. Salcedo, R. 2010. The Last Slum: Moving from Illegal Settlements to
Subsidized Home Ownership in Chile. Urban Affairs Review 46, 90–118.
https://doi.org/10.1177/1078087410368487
<https://doi.org/10.1177/1078087410368487>
Please send expressions of interest/abstracts (250-300 words) and a title
by the *15th of February 2018* to: Vidya Sagar Pancholi (
[log in to unmask])
Best wishes,
Vidya Sagar Pancholi
PhD Student, Urban Studies and Planning
The University of Sheffield,
Teaching Fellow, The Bartlett Development Planning Unit,
University College London
