Sociologický časopis / Czech Sociological Review 2012, 48(2): 247-282

Between Resistance and Adaptation: The Everyday Practices of the Poorest Class

Petr Vašát
Fakulta filozofická Západočeské univerzity v Plzni

The article studies homelessness in the city of Pilsen, but instead of the traditional perspective, which works with the common definition of a 'homeless person', it introduces and defines the relational concept of the poorest class. The advantages of this class concept are that: (1) it does not rule out the possibility of the construction of a notion of home by members of this class; (2) it provides more information about social practices generally; (3) it focuses on the agent-individual, avoiding the reification of a homeless person in the form of a homogeneous group. Using the concepts of active agency and space-time the article aims to describe time-space mobility, everyday practices, and the production of places of the observed agents. This study draws on the theories of Pierre Bourdieu and Michel de Certeau and on the space-time theories of David Harvey, Thorsten Hägerstrand, and Michel Foucault. It works with ethnographic data and puts forth the idea that unlike dominant places, which are strategically produced and can be ascribed one dominant meaning and associated practice, in the case of tactically produced places there are always multiple meanings and thus a myriad of associated practices. These specific places are 'heterotopias'. The article describes the (re)production of one heterotopia and in doing so offers an empirically based conceptualisation of such a place.

Keywords: homelessness, the poorest class, space-time, everyday practices, time-space mobility, heterotopias, urban revitalisation, spatial hierarchy

Published: April 1, 2012Show citation

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Vašát, P. (2012). Between Resistance and Adaptation: The Everyday Practices of the Poorest Class. Sociologický časopis / Czech Sociological Review, 48(2), 247-282.
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