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8 - Place Detachment and the Psychology of Nonbelonging

Lessons from Diepsloot Township

from Part II - Migration, Mobility and Belonging

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 July 2021

Christopher M. Raymond
Affiliation:
University of Helsinki, Finland
Lynne C. Manzo
Affiliation:
University of Washington, Seattle
Daniel R. Williams
Affiliation:
USDA Forest Service, Colorado
Andrés Di Masso
Affiliation:
Universitat de Barcelona
Timo von Wirth
Affiliation:
Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam
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Summary

This chapter aims to describe the psychology of nonbelonging through co-constructed accounts by informal settlement residents who belong – yet also struggle to not belong – to ‘non-places’ such as the informal settlement. It illustrates how (non)belonging is performed as unspoken affective senses of place that are resonant in narratives. Using Lacanian psychoanalytic insights, the chapter contributes to an expanded conceptualisation of ‘senses of place’ by showing that we also perform place belonging in an ‘unconscious’ sense – beyond our discursive performances (place identity) or expressed feeling states (place attachment). This epistemological stance highlights senses of place belonging as coordinated via an unspoken social contract with the hovering interlocutor (Other), who offers the navigational cues to situate where we are (place) and to define who we are (identity).

Type
Chapter
Information
Changing Senses of Place
Navigating Global Challenges
, pp. 103 - 115
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

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