Wednesday, 03 April 2013

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‘No life.’ Young people talking about poverty Last month I helped organise and run an event involving children and young people in poverty, so that government officials could hear them talk about their experiences. The slightly formal context of a conference venue was going to be unfamiliar for the participants, the timetable was very tight, and they would not know most of the others there. So we designed a mix of plenary and group sessions, exercises, discussions, and one short presentation; followed by a trip round the houses of parliament. We also had to take account of the fact that some of the young people had fairly complex backgrounds and there was always a chance that attention spans would be short and their behaviour could be what is euphemistically called ‘challenging’. One of the exercises was designed to allow some of the experience to be fictionalised: this gave the participants ‘permission’ to release some fairly strong concerns – and some personal aspirations - that otherwise might not have been shared. This post summarises that process. We had seven groups of about 5 or 6 per table, of mixed ages. Using a pre-printed worksheet, each group was asked to invent a character and describe their family background and the area where they lived. Prompt cards were provided but only the age of the child was prescribed, in order to ensure a variety. We used the carousel principle so that each table inherited the character created by others. The second stage required them to think about the skills, interests, fears and friendships of the character. We provided plenty of prompt cards for this stage, covering a broad mix of options to get people talking: some groups used these while others chose to draw or write, for example - Fears: ‘not being able to leave the estate’ ‘A bit afraid of new people. Doesn’t know what is happening.’ ‘He does not go to school so he don’t have a good ajication.’ They all offered a reasonable degree of consistency – that is to say, there were only a few apparent contradictions along the lines of ‘loner’ / ‘team player’. In the next stage, inheriting a character with some detail known about them, the participants were asked to think up a crisis (or crises) that affected the individual, and to describe the implications. As we had anticipated, this gave them no difficulties whatsoever, although there were one or two oddities – ‘No life. Goes into foster home & runs away. Police find him and Bob wants to stay with the policeman.’ ‘They move to a small stone hut.’ There was plenty of mention of adults in the household losing their jobs, plus imprisonment and quite unceremonially reported death. In the last group phase, they were asked to think through the future for the invented character they inherited, given what was known about their circumstances and the crisis which afflicted them. Here, what was striking was the sense of resilience in some of the outcomes (but not all): ‘Finally he got his...
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‘Villages evolve, don't they?’ The debate about urban design will surely always be with us. John Harris had a rather inconclusive piece in the Guardian on Saturday about some of those new squeaky-clean housing developments and the culture they represent – aspirational, artificial, organic…? ‘The pristine, faux-traditional houses are the same as those you see all over the country, offering the promise of "traditional living with modern comforts."’ And so he asks, ‘If you use the word "village" and learn from the planning mistakes of the past, can you quickly build a community from scratch?’ Although he doesn’t really get face to face with the question, there are several delightful insights, including this one from Terri Clarke, a resident of Fairford Leys: "It's referred to as a village, but it's an estate," Terri insists. "The fact that it was all built at the same time means it's an estate. Villages evolve, don't they?" Thank you Terri. I’ve been round a few such places (including Poundbury, which is hardly typical) and a few things have struck me. The architecture is invariably an improvement on what was left us by the architects and planners of the 1960s and 1970s. And there is more likely to be a mix of renovated and new build of different sizes with social and private housing. The developers’ contribution to local amenities almost always lags behind and the eventual level of provision is probably seldom adequate. The public realm matters everywhere. The article quotes architect John Simpson, emphasising in these new developments ‘a public realm, rather than just leftover space, which is what you get on housing estates.’ So who was responsible for designing housing estates without a public realm? Why? People reflect readily on their neighbourhood, but snobbery around words like ‘estate’ and ‘village’ surfaces quite easily. These snobberies can get institutionalised in the regulation of residents through terms and conditions, with some of the least rational forms emerging. Thus one of the residents quoted in the article says she’s ‘not allowed solar panels’. The version of ‘heritage’ espoused by her residents’ association presumably excludes the idea of future generations inheriting an inhabitable planet. These estates have often achieved a subtle, possibly unnoticed, control over vehicle traffic, so that kids can play in the street. If the residents’ association allows that sort of thing, of course. Some people are clearly suspicious of the ‘prissy’ over-prescribed environment, and readily contrast it to some notion of ‘community’ which entertains a degree of lively disorder. Others appear to have a fear of disorder (which itself can seem like a psychological disorder at times) and will invest heavily in the local politics of protection: for them, ‘community’ is characterised by peace and predictability. Maybe we can’t build for all sorts and shouldn't try. To return to the question posed: ‘can you quickly build a community from scratch?’ There's a superficial answer, which is that in some circumstances you can of course: it helps to have an identifiable shared adversity. But the question begs too...

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