Abstract
In this chapter, I consider an apparent paradox drawn from the work of Loïc Wacquant—non-convergence between the forms of urban marginality in Europe and the United States, but the emergence of a common regime of global advanced urban marginalization—which challenges the empirical investigation of the relationship between “marginality” and “identity”. I examine the ethnographic implications of this relationship through incorporating analyses of time, space, and individual narratives. While the ethnicization of social relations and identity politics have emerged as media topos in Europe, I point out the actual fluidity of identifications in defamed neighbourhoods and analyse their rationale.
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Notes
- 1.
For an enlightening deconstruction of this type of schematism, see Matthew Desmond (2015).
- 2.
- 3.
See the gran débat sur l’identité nationale launched in 2009 by the Ministry of Immigration, Integration, and National Identity (Marchand and Ratineau 2012).
- 4.
The theory of established-outsider relations (Elias and Scotson 1965) shows how internal group dynamics ensure that a more powerful “established” group will attribute to itself the characteristics associated with the “minority of the best” of that group; and will perceive and construct the weaker “outsider” group based on the behaviour of the “minority of the worst” of that group.
- 5.
In fact, marginalized neighbourhoods seem to be an airlock as much as a trap, a territory where one arrives and leaves—usually in a logic of ascent (Pan Ké Shon 2009; Estèbe 2016). The apparent stability of the indicators of poverty is largely explained by the fact that those who leave are replaced by new entrants who could hardly settle elsewhere. This is the classical logic of the “springboard” territory (Saunders 2010).
- 6.
- 7.
On the contrary, refusing the reconversion is one of the pillars of entry into political violence (Truong 2018).
- 8.
See Youssef, who defines himself alternately as a “French”, a “Tunisian”, a “Parisian”, a “banlieuesard” or coming “from Marseille” according to the context.
- 9.
In his study, William Foote Whyte shows well that a gang of boys sharing and advocating the same way of life can only exist if each gang member is permanently different from the other members of the gang, which is the purpose of the bowling game scores (Whyte 1943).
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Truong, F. (2019). Fluid Identifications in the Age of Advanced Marginality. In: Flint, J., Powell, R. (eds) Class, Ethnicity and State in the Polarized Metropolis. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-16222-1_6
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