Racialized Rurality: White Working-Class Young People and Bonded Social Capital

• In Event: Friday Roundtable Session 4:55 pm
  In Roundtable Session: Rural Community Futures: Migration and Civil Life (Table 15)

Abstract

The paper critically reflects on data derived from prolonged periods of ethnographic study in an economically disadvantaged White working class rural community in the North East of England. A central aim of the study to understand the culture of the community and to capture and penetrate its social relationships, experiences and meanings. The paper draws on interviews conducted with White working-class young people aged 16-21 years old (N=35), born in the village who were neither in education, employment or training. The findings suggest the everyday experiences of rural deprivation and disadvantage to result in the young people drawing on racialized exclusionary bonded social capital generated ideas and networks in order to make sense of their predicament and socio-culturally economically survive.

Author

• Carl Bagley, Queen's University - Belfast