The Encounter

Authors on the encounter

• Gill Valentine
  • Living with difference: reflection on geographies of encounter (2008)
  • Biographical narratives of encounter: The significance of mobility and emplacement in shaping attitudes towards difference (2014)
  • Living with difference: proximity and encounter in urban life (2013)
• Ash Amin (2012)
• Gordon W. Allport (1954) The nature of prejudice
• Gibson-Graham (2004)
• Mandy de Wilde (2013)
• Helen F. Wilson - Human Geography department Manchester Uni
  • On geography and encounter: Bodies, borders and difference (2016)
• Nick Schuermans - Department of Geography Vrije universiteit Brussel. Heeft ook papers met Stijn geschreven

Kritisch kijken naar wat geschreven is en hoe wij dat kunnen plaatsen in onze praktijken.

Wat is the encounter --> Interactie. Effectief kijken naar de interventie + the encounter

Keywords

Geographies of encounter; Geography of encounter; Encounter; Contact hypothesis;

Definition & Concepts

The encounter

verb (used with object)

1. to come upon or meet with, especially unexpectedly
2. to meet with or contend against (difficulties, opposition, etc.)
3. to meet (a person, military force, etc.) in conflict

verb (used without object)

1. to meet, especially unexpectedly or in conflict

noun

1. a meeting with a person or thing, especially a casual, unexpected, or brief meeting
2. a meeting of persons or groups that are in conflict or opposition: combat: battle

Psychology

1. a meeting of two or more people, as the members of an encounter group or a number of married couples (marriage encounter) conducted to promote direct emotional confrontation among the participants, especially as a form of therapy (encounter therapy)

Equal-Status Contact

An equal-status contact is a person or group who has a similar background, history, social role, and education. This is a concept of the contact hypothesis which is a theory regarding how best to improve relations between groups that display hostility towards each other.

The Encounter

• "I begin by critiquing some of the work celebrating urban encounters through using empirical examples of where contact with difference leaves attitudes and values unmoved, and even hardened, before going on to consider debates about what kind of encounters produces what might be termed 'meaningful contact'. By this I mean contact that actually changes values and translates beyond the specifics of the individual moment into a more general positieve respect for - rather than merely tolerance of - others. In doing so, I identify a paradoxical gap that emerges in geographies of encounter between values and practices." (Valentine, 2008, p.325).

Argument for intervening with the encounter, setting up the encounter

• "Holland et al., 2007 found that, although their research sites were frequented by a range of different groups, this did not necessarily mean that there was any contact between the diverse inhabitants. Rather, their observation suggested that while different groups coexisted and even observed each other, none the less there was little actual mixing between different users who self-segregated within particular spaces carving out their own territory....... Likewise, Ash Amin (2002) has observed that city streets are spaces of transit that produce little actual connection or exchange between strangers. A process exacerbated by the emergence of a mobile phone culture, which Deborah Cameron (2000) has observed, contributes to incivility in public space as individuals move in and through locations while locked in the private worlds of their conversations with remote others." (Valentine, 2008, p.326).

Due to self-segragation in for example educational arrangements, places of worship, social and cultural networks, many communities operate on the basis of a series of parallel lives. Lives often do not seem to touch at any point, let alone overlap and promote and meaningful interchange (Valentine, 2008, p.326).

Ash Amin (2002) argues for 'micro-publics of everyday social contact and encounter'. These are events and sites where people from different backgrounds are brought together on purpose. While the encounter often refers to unexpected, none planned, 'meetings' or 'contact', Ash Amin (2002) proposes a planned and organised meeting.

Types of encounter

public encounter

Start: Charles Goodsell (The Public Encounter: Where State and Citizen meet, 1981).

Signaled: the pervasive influence of encounters with public professionals on the daily lives of citizens.

Traditionally: Max Weber, main point of reference: regulated by formal responsabilities and moral obligations (Weber, 1922).

Initially: studied as / focus on consequences of bureaucratization (field of organization studies. More recently: digital encounters. Antroplogy and political science: bureaucratization and corruption (Miller eta al., 2001).

Alternative models: attacking the traditional model of bureaucracy. Not debate on public encounters per se.

Lipsky (1980) study on street level democracy concrete situations and problems, coping mechanisms, became hallmark of many empirical analyses -> ongoring debate on 'discretion'. First problematic (democratic control). But positive view (creative, deliberative and informed judgement (Wagenaar 2004) -> inspired analyses of the narratives of front line professionals -> public encounters not a mere matter of service delivery but vital element of democratic governance. In this view: public encounters: nurtering personal relationships and constructive communication. Equally empowered.

No recent study uses the concept of public encounters.

The understandings of public encounters seems to be locked in individualist ontology in which people are seen as separate beings and ‘public professionals’ and ‘citizens’ form fixed social positions (Stout & Staton, 2011)

Alternative: relational ontology: people are intrinsically connected in ongoing interactional processes in wchich they constantly and inescapably ‘interweave’ into something different by the very process of meeting (Follet, 1919, 1924).

This renders it futile to look at an encounter in terms of “I” and “you”;

it is the “I-Thou” (Buber, 1970), encounter (Anderson et. Al., 2004).

Relational approach: “what public professionals and citizens are able to do is the product of the quality of the ongoing interactional process through which they encounter each other” (Stout & Staton, 2011)

Particular qualitative process:”…..with the particular texture of contextual interaction or contact and a kind of mutual learning through activity and interaction that such contact provides…which exists as a relational  possiblilty in concrete settings (Campbell Rawlings & Catlaw, 2011, P. 51)

From: Bartels, K. P. R. (2012). Communicative capacity: How public encounters affect the quality of participatory democracy. Glasgow: University of Glasgow http://theses.gla.ac.uk/3517/1/2012bartelsphd.pdf

Abstract (public encounter, democracy, participatory democracy, communicative capacity, process)

The Encounter

Formele omschrijving

Description of literature on the encounter

Schema: ZHDSM scheme, Context: ZHDSM context
Verwant: ZHDSM Ash Amin, ZHDSM Gibson-Graham, ZHDSM Gill Valentine

Referenties

• Samenvatting Bartels Public Encounter, Petra de Braal, 19 januari 2018.