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Contact Information
Professor
Roger Burrows Michael Hardey |
ProjectsSORTING PLACES OUT? CLASSIFICATION AND ITS CONSEQUENCES IN AN E-SOCIETY Summary How do the myriad geodemographic classifications of neighbourhoods that now exist influence life 'on the ground' for people in the UK? This project asks how abstract digitally derived ascribed categorizations of place compare with the range of immanent lay perceptions of place that pertain within particular neighbourhoods. It also asks what influence (if any) such classifications have upon the everyday life of people in different types of neighbourhoods. There is a need for this research because of concerns that in an e-society there are invisible processes of prioritisation and marginalisation at work, as software is used to judge people's worth, eligibility and levels of access to a whole range of spaces and services. Widespread processes of sorting, clustering and typifying have come to form a central feature of what some would view as post-panoptic society. Agents of surveillance no longer need to observe concrete individuals; more likely is the creation of categories of interest and classes of conduct thought worthy of attention, the data capture necessary for the creation of which is, increasingly "designed in" to the flows of everyday life. This urge to classify is nowhere more apparent than in the myriad classifications of 'places' that have emerged in recent years. We are thus taking geodemographic classifications are an exemplar of such 'sortware sorting' processes. The research will be of interest to a range of different stakeholders: the geodemographics and marketing industry; community and neighbourhood groups; policy actors with a remit for neighbourhood regeneration; and all those with an interest in the manner in which digital technologies are contributing to the restructuring of urban life in Britain. The research will begin 'on the ground' within four contrasting neighbourhoods. Within each of these we will 'audit' the range of area-based classificatory systems to which each is subject. We will then compare and contrast these digitally derived ascribed categorizations of place with the range of lay perceptions of place that pertain within each neighbourhood as manifest in the discourses of local actors. This done, we will purposively select three of the classificatory schemas implicated in these processes of categorical ascription for further detailed study. Finally, we will return to each of our neighbourhoods in order to explore how our three exemplar classifications impinge upon the mundane realities of each place 'on the ground' Within each of our four selected case study neighbourhoods we will engage in intensive data collection. In addition to the collation of historical and statistical data on each place we will also gather observational, interview and focus group data. At the same time as we are gaining data 'on the ground' we will also be 'auditing' the range of classificatory schemes that each neighbourhood is subject to. This will, by necessity, involve more investigative and exploratory strategies of data collection. From this audit of classifications we will select three for for more detailed wider examination. Using a combination of investigative archival work and semistructured interviews with key actors we will examine each classificatory schema and 'map' the complex organizational and technological networks within which each are embedded. We will carry out qualitative analyses of the data guided by analytic and substantive questions such as: Who originally constructed it and why? What methods, assumptions and data went into its construction? How were the labels for the various categories arrived at? By what means did data derived from individuals, with or without their knowledge, find its way into each schema? Where does the classification reside, and in what forms? Who uses it? How do they use it? How is it marketed? Is it publicly manifest? We thus aim to offer an analysis that 'gets inside' the institutional spaces, networks and perhaps even software code itself in order to examine how places are being sorted out. Finally, with this wider understanding of the manner in which different types of classification function we will return to our case study neighbourhoods to explore some of the mechanisms by which people living in these particular areas are subject to the operation of such schemas. The work will take 24 months to complete and will be finished by Nov. 2006. Outputs Burrows, R. and Ellison, N. ‘Sorting Places Out? Towards a Social Politics of Neighbourhood Informatisation’ Information, Communication and Society, 7, 3, 321-336, 2004 Burrows, R. and Gane, N. ‘Geodemographics, Software and Class’ Sociology, Forthcoming 2006. Burrows, R. 'Why should sociologists be interested in geodemographics?'
Nexus - the magazine of the Australian Sociological Association,
Feb 2006. [Summary of TASA 2005 Conference Plenary Presentation] |
