About
This research investigates the
margin in the urban space,
analyzing the
sense of place of people dwelling in the margin
through the
lens of food.
Food-related projects that adopt
strategies of care through food: the Neighborhood House (food distribution)
and Urban Garden(food production)
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Sense of place in the margin has been analyzed according to three dimensions in these projects:
margin, need, and care.
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According to Cresswell (1992),
Escobar (2001),
Massey (2004)
bell hooks (1989)
O’Connel,
Brannen (2021)
Joan Tronto (1993)
Research question
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Can caring relationships through the satisfaction of multiple needs related to food have a transformative power on the sense of place of people dwelling in the margin, and extending to wider places?
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Methodology
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Qualitative, Participative, Visual: deconstruct top-down representations of the margin and return a complex, grassroot picture of Barriera di Milano and its places, according to the feminist and decolonial epistemologies and literature
Positionality, reflexivity, intersectionality
Methods
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- Participant observation
- Semi-structured interviews with countermapping activities
- Ethnographic video and photo, multimodal and interactive documentary
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THE FIELDWORK
5 months (June-July / September- December)
900 min of interviews (average interview duration 50 min)
18 interviews (8 participants for each project + directors of both projects)
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Sampling criteria:
- living in Barriera di Milano
-Participating in the projects for at least 1 year
-Preference for racialized female interlocutors
Neighborhood
house
Urban
Garden
5 racialized women
1 italian women
2 italian men
4 italian women
4 italian men
Data analysis and discussion
The margin
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Sense of place as a social construction (outsider-insider gaze) according to the positionality
The margin is fluid and mobile, it is characterized by the race-based cleavage and the visibility of the racialized people
Barriera as BARRIERAS
Aged and Italian people: romanticized idea of the past neighborhood that now is invaded
Migrant subjects that find in Barriera their own center
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Need for food
Neighborhood
house
Food has a crucial role of in shaping sense of place, as it informs us of identity, of memory.
Food-related needs differ mainly on a class and gender basis.
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Material needs (quantity before quality). Psycho-social dimension of food poverty: food experienced with frustration and guilt because of food distribution perceived as assistance
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Food needs related to quality and social moments. Activity in the garden as non-profitable in economic terms. Benefits from the garden related to quality of food produced and the activity of gardening itself, that is understood as mentally and physically good for health.
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Food as aid
Food as care
Urban
Garden
Care
Neighborhood
house
Urban
Garden
Participants perceive mostly assistance rather than care. Transformative power of care limited to people that activate themselves in the project. Competition among participants. Ability to bring together different subjectivities to create community but limited capacity of dialogue and involvement.
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Individual activity practice of taking care. Care as psychoemotional and physical health of gardeners, taking care of oneself through the relationship with the place, with the land and their fruits. Less accessible to marginalized subjects.
Final remarks
Both the fields can be defined as liminal places that achieve to have an impact on people's lives promoting openness, encounter and mediation, but both reflect structural limitations linked to racial, gender and class cleavages that are difficult to eradicate, as well as the limited role of the third sector in welfare of proximity.
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How can we imagine food distribution and production activities in a way that can overcome marginalizing practices that enforce the stigma of the margin?
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