The ‘lamentable sight’ of homelessness and the society of the spectacle
- Authors: Gerrard, Jessica , Farrugia, David
- Date: 2015
- Type: Text , Journal article
- Relation: Urban Studies Vol. 52, no. 12 (2015), p. 2219-2233
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- Description: In this paper, we contend that the visual discourses of poverty and inequality are constructed through everyday social relations – the visual, spatial and bodily ‘encounter’ with homelessness in public space, steeped in the politics of the stigmatised Other. Bringing together Erving Goffman’s theory of everyday encounters with Guy Debord’s society of the spectacle, we explore the intersection between the ‘sight’ and ‘scene’ of homelessness and the spectacle of capital in public space. We identify how everyday encounters with homelessness perpetuate the notion that homelessness is ‘out of joint’ in relation to the spatial and aesthetic logic of capital and commodity consumption and performance. Reflecting on the repercussions of this for understanding homelessness, we explore the aesthetic dimension of the experience of homelessness within the context of a public space saturated by the social and aesthetic relations and of capital. © 2014, © Urban Studies Journal Limited 2014.
Addressing the problem of reflexivity in theories of reflexive modernisation : Subjectivity and structural contradiction
- Authors: Farrugia, David
- Date: 2015
- Type: Text , Journal article
- Relation: Journal of Sociology Vol. 51, no. 4 (2015), p. 872-886
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- Description: This article addresses debates within theories of reflexive modernisation about the meaning of reflexivity for understanding contemporary subjectivities. The article demonstrates that the contribution that this concept could make to theories of modern subjectivity has been limited by the problematic assumption that reflexivity describes a form of critical rationality leading to emancipation from social constraint and the sovereign self-fashioning of identity. Both critiqued and defended on these grounds, debate about reflexivity and reflexive modernisation has been limited by a sociologically unsustainable vision of modern subjectivity, and has left theories of reflexive modernisation open to the accusation that they are blind to the relationship between subjectivity and social structure. In response, this article constructs a theory of reflexivity as a social practice which reflects the contradictions and insecurities intrinsic to modern social structures. Conceived as a social practice, reflexivity is a concept that combines the macro and the micro, the structural and the personal. Capturing historically specific forms of structural organisation, as well as the practices through which these structures are made into biographies, the concept of reflexive subjectivity can make a significant theoretical contribution to understandings of modern identities. © The Author(s) 2013.