Sunday, 04 January 2015

Not seeing the neighbours around

Here’s a curious survey finding:

Almost 71 per cent of Kiwis cite ‘not seeing their neighbours around’ as the reason for not knowing them better.

This comes from this article in Scoop, which I just caught up with, referring to a survey conducted by Neighbourly.co.nz, an online networking service. It echoes the theme of ‘occupation of the neighbourhood’ that I bang on about from time to time.

Unfortunately I couldn’t find anything more about the survey on their site, but I assume that this phrase was one of a number of answer options, and perhaps the responses might have been ranked. It would be handy to know what the other options were.

I also learned (here) that 78.6 per cent of respondents claim to have at least one neighbour ‘from whom they could borrow a cup of sugar’. This serves to remind me that one day I’d really like to include a survey question somewhere asking if anyone has ever borrowed a cup of sugar, anywhere. Where did this strange assumed tradition come from? And why is it perpetuated in surveys? Asking about holding neighbours' door keys might be more useful, I suggest.

 

4 Jan 2015 19:44:08 | Neighbourhood relations

3 Comments

I once borrowed a cup of sugar from a neighbour. Except, I never gave it back - so, I guess I once got a cup of sugar from a neighbour ...

Posted by: Milly Cockayne | Tuesday, 06 January 2015 at 20:00

Ah, that was you was it?

Posted by: Kevin Harris | Tuesday, 06 January 2015 at 20:17

Neighbours are cool, but nosy ones ? not so cool

Posted by: K&A India | Monday, 19 January 2015 at 11:41

The comments to this entry are closed.

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Sixty-seconds of neighbouring I was out front filling window-sill cracks this morning when one of my elderly neighbours appeared alongside, with a bottle of medicine. ‘I don’t want to come too close,’ he said, ‘I’ve got a dreadful cold. But could you help me to open this?’ It had a modern child-proof cap, which I loosened. As he took the bottle back I thought, perhaps this is an innovation that post-dates the last time he took medicine? That would be characteristic, for this is a ruggedly independent, practical man who would seldom ask a favour. We talked briefly about other things and off he went. There are several classic neighbouring themes bound up in this tiny encounter: I’ll try to round them up concisely. First, it’s a reminder that when we ask survey questions about whether neighbours ‘exchange favours,’ the point is really about the latent potential for support, together with the readiness to draw on it. Time and again we’ve had studies on aspects of neighbouring which say this happens or that happens to a given percentage, but don’t help us to get at the ways of optimising informal support. Seeing me out there, from his window or door – and faced with a medical need he had not managed to resolve by himself – my neighbour took the opportunity to draw on the accretion of adequate familiarity from years of recognition and the occasional few, largely inconsequential words. As I noted some years ago, the essence of neighbouring is that it is low-level and relatively trivial, but it accumulates. Next, we have the old theme of visibly occupying the neighbourhood. I was outside and therefore legitimately open to interruption. It’s unlikely he would have gone round knocking, for such a favour. It reminded me of comments from a workshop participant years ago (reported here, p11), relating how long it had taken her to paint her front door, because of all the neighbourly conversations that followed from occupying that semi-private, pseudo-community space. I also recall someone in an audience deciding on the same basis that she was going to grow potatoes in her front garden. And two more points, based on the fact that we have been neighbours for 28 years. This exchange was nothing to do with ‘visiting in each other’s houses’ – as some surveys like to frame relations; nor was it anything to do with knowing names. We call each other by our first names; I don’t know his surname and I doubt he knows mine. I have never been in his house nor he in mine. An understanding of neighbouring that gets distracted by such details, it seems to me, risks overlooking more important ingredients: mainly - the fundamental importance of recurring visual recognition; that neighbouring is not the same as friendship; and that it is founded on respect for privacy and the navigability of semi-private space.
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Community development: we are where we always were I just caught up with this paper last year by Gary Craig - who is always worth reading and hearing – offering a short history of community development in England. I’m glad I took the time. As the paper brings us up to date he notes (emphasis added): ‘There is a bipartisan view of community in Westminster which, paralleling the attacks on those who are not within the declining bubble of being hard-working decent people, sees community through the lens… of conformity, conditionality and moral prescription. Unfortunately most of the key organisations which might have contested this territory and the definitions it represents have either had to close or have been neutralised… ‘Remember that community development is not a neutral intervention but an ideologically contested one… Continue to ask yourself, whose side are you on? And if you are unsure, check back to the core values of community development, values which are about social justice and equality, respect and democratic control.’

Kevin Harris

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