Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- About the author
- Foreword by Danny Dorling
- Introduction
- 1 St Ann’s, Nottingham: a working-class story
- 2 ‘Being St Ann’s’
- 3 The missing men
- 4 ‘A little bit of sugar’
- 5 ‘On road, don’t watch that’
- 6 ‘The roof is on fire’: despair, fear and civil unrest
- 7 Last words: the working class – a sorry state?
- Afterword by Owen Jones
- Bibliography
- Index
5 - ‘On road, don’t watch that’
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 April 2023
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- About the author
- Foreword by Danny Dorling
- Introduction
- 1 St Ann’s, Nottingham: a working-class story
- 2 ‘Being St Ann’s’
- 3 The missing men
- 4 ‘A little bit of sugar’
- 5 ‘On road, don’t watch that’
- 6 ‘The roof is on fire’: despair, fear and civil unrest
- 7 Last words: the working class – a sorry state?
- Afterword by Owen Jones
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
There are many sayings and phrases that are used on the estate, and they make perfect sense. The people who live on this estate, and probably in estates all over the UK, have an uncanny knack of saying something that is so succinct, getting to the heart of what is needed, in ways I have never known in other areas of my life. In the academic world the practice is, I believe, why say something in 100 words when you can say it 10,000? In working-class communities the opposite is true – one phrase can explain a whole essay of practice. One of my favourite phrases is a relatively new phrase and that is, ‘don’t watch that’. This means exactly what it says – ‘don’t watch’, ‘don’t look’, but more importantly, ‘don’t see’ and ‘don’t be interested’. I have heard this used in many ways. One of the men in the gym was on his phone talking to a woman who was not his girlfriend; when the other men asked him who he was speaking to, his response was, ‘don’t watch that’. I have heard other men say it when they are ‘doing business’ on the street and neighbours might be having a look, and I have heard women say it to each other, especially when discussing their taste in clothing, and if you ask where they bought something or how much something cost. I have also seen arguments and fights break out over ‘watching’ when someone has commented on another’s action/behaviour/practice. The common response is, ‘why you watching me?’ – ‘don’t watch that’. Having this type of ‘insider’ knowledge, but understanding why it is important, has meant that I have become close to many of the residents in this community, and I have been allowed to see and know many parts of people’s lives that would be difficult to understand without this insider knowledge. I am trusted because I don’t judge, I accept how things are, and I understand that in ‘getting by’, hard choices and decisions are often made within families. And as long as I respect this code, my ‘watching’ is tolerated.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Getting ByEstates, Class and Culture in Austerity Britain, pp. 147 - 168Publisher: Bristol University PressPrint publication year: 2015