‘Get a life’ or ‘Got
a life’: new Travellers as a problem or a solution
Alan Dearling, Research Fellow, Vauxhall
Centre for the Study of Crime, University of Luton. Prepared for
the University of Greenwich seminar: New Directions in Romani
Studies, 11/6/98. Potentially for publication in an edited
collection of papers from the conference, edited by Thomas Acton
for the University of Hertfordshire Press, 1999.
The problems of research
Increasingly, I’m alarmed that researchers and academics
are turning new Travellers and members of the so-called DIY community
into a ‘research problem’. They seem motivated more
towards meeting their own ends as ‘professional researchers’,
rather than the needs of the community(ies) they are observing.
Certainly, research is about gaining insight into communities
and making sense of social interactions, but at what cost to those
being studied? I’d add that this problem appears to be getting
worse at the very time when the research community is being urged
(once again) to adopt more participative research methods such
as group interviews, focus groups and participatory research appraisal
(Hurley, 1998; Alderson, 1995; University of Hull, n.d)
Traditionally, researchers have tested theories and assumptions
out on communities. This has been known as positivistic research.
However, in Traveller communities, where assumptions about behaviour
can easily lead to entirely incorrect interpretations, it is reasonable
to expect researchers to adopt research methods which include,
as a major element, day-to-day involvement in the lives of the
people who are being ‘researched’. A particularly
vitriolic attack on the role of ‘observers’ and ‘commentators’,
and one which I have a lot of sympathy for, comes in Do or Die
7 (1998) in their review of the Big Issue book, Gathering
Force:
"Our actions are packaged; wrapped up in sugar
coating to make them more palatable for the middle classes to
swallow. It is almost like people can’t be trusted to speak
for themselves, but their actions have to explained by ‘respectable’
experts; interpreted and made safe." (Searle, 1997)
Blumer (1969) has warned the research community of the danger
of, "…shaping the empirical world to fit one’s
theories". As an antidote to this, the ‘naturalistic’
methods of research, including ‘ethnomethodology’
recommend that the world should be studied in "its ‘natural
state’ undisturbed by the researcher" (Hammersley
and Atkinson, 1995). Obviously, this purist form of ‘naturalism’
is, in itself, a bit naïve. The researcher will always have
an effect on the individual or group under scrutiny, and vice
versa, the researcher will be influenced by the social group.
Engagement in the social activity of the group builds trust; encourages
‘normal’ patterns of behaviour and can lead to the
most complete level of understanding of social activity and different
cultural behaviour. But, in its most extreme form, this can lead
to the researcher ‘going native’ and becoming an active
proponent of the group, rather than a participant/observer. The
questions then are: Is this automatically bad? Is it entirely
inappropriate?
George Orwell said,
"If a writer on a political subject manages
to preserve a detached attitude, it is nearly always because he
doesn’t know what he’s talking about. To understand
a political movement, one has to be involved in it. And as soon
as one is involved one becomes a propagandist."
In the three longer publications about Travellers which I have
compiled on my own and with others (Earle, 1994; Dearling, 1997;
and Dearling, 1998) the aim has specifically been to act as a
facilitator for new Travellers and members of the Direct Action
and DIY culture to have their own ‘stories’ and history
presented to a wider public. This makes the purpose of research,
to:
- help people write their own history and make sense of their
own lives;
- challenge stereotyping; and
- provide the research community and interested others with
first-hand accounts of (in this instance) the evolving world
of new Travellers and those associated with them.
This could lead to the creation of a role for the researcher
as ‘activist’. To me, this seems especially important
at a time when more academic courses are allowing students and
academics in a variety of disciplines including health care, social
anthropology, sociology, geography and ethnography, to use new
Travellers as their research topic. This very process turns individuals,
people with a variety of lifestyles and cultures, into a research
‘problem’. It also seems to breed a whole range of
theoretical and academicised rubbish. For instance what do we
really learn about new Travellers and their lifestyle, from:
New Age Travellers are
a ‘bund’ "an elective, unstable, charismatic,
intensely affected form of societion" which
the writer, Hetherington (1996) recommends should be viewed in
terms of, "identity formation and the relationship
to heterotopic space."
Compare this with the realities faced by Travellers and other
members of nomadic community. For instance, Brian Monger from
the King’s Hill collective is quoted in Thomson (1997):
"We got on our bikes...living here we’re
taking pressure off homelessness. We’re part of the solution,
no longer part of the problem. Also we go a long way to help with
poverty because we grow our own food and can live on very little
money...we want to create a woodland garden where people can live
with nature rather than destroying it."
It doesn’t seem unreasonable that researchers should be
able to help report these activities as well as the struggles
of Travellers, whether it is legal and legislative problems, or
difficulties associated with access to education, healthcare,
stable sites or an economic means of surviving. As Bence-Jones
(1995) puts it:
"…travellers are seen as a problem group
rather than the difficulties they experience as a group."
In Rio in 1992, the British government’s representative
put their signature to the Agenda 21 resolution which called all
nations to,
"…support the shelter efforts made by
the urban and rural poor, the unemployed and the low-income groups,
by adopting regulations to facilitate access to land, finance
and low-cost building materials."
Judging by what we hear from the Traveller Research Unit at Cardiff,
Friends and Families of Travellers and in the counter-cultural
media of Squall, Undercurrents, SchNews etc., the position
of Travellers since the 1994 Criminal Justice and Public Order
Act has worsened, rather than improved. And in my own No Boundaries
(1998) many of the writers cite that decline in toleration as
one of the factors which led them to leave England and experience
life abroad. It is not a simple model of legal persecution through
one piece of poor legislation. The lack of sites and stopping
places for Travellers pre-dates the CJA. Even when section 24
of the 1960 Caravans Act was made mandatory in the 1968 Caravans
Acts, most county councils made no effort to provide caravan site
accommodation. In addition, planning laws have aggravated the
situation by preventing rather than aiding most applications for
Traveller sites or low-impact dwellings (see Thomson, 1997 and
FFT, 1996).
Get a life or Got life?
Luckily, not all writers and researchers are compounding the
problem. Many like Clark and Shuinéar, both in Acton (1997),
do offer analysis and commentary which helps us to understand
why Travellers, and new Travellers in particular, are vilified
in the way that they are, and how their lives make perfect sense
on their own terms. Clark talks of the ‘normalisation of
the lifestyle’ and describes Claudia, who is,
"…just one New Traveller whose nomadism
constitutes a ‘settled way of life’."
And Shuinéar looks at the way in which the concept of
‘otherness’ leads the mainstream society to attribute
all their own fears onto Travellers, everything that they are,
"unhappy or worried about in themselves." Thankfully,
this interpretation would be far closer to how many Travellers
themselves feel about the way they are treated. They do think
of themselves as leading a life with rules, community, and one
which is totally understandable for a variety of reasons, depending
upon such factors as whether they chose a nomadic lifestyle, or
felt that it was the only choice left. This also seems far more
down-to-earth and commonsensical than Hetherington’s interpretation
of new Travellers as:
"…out of place not because they belong somewhere else,
but because they belong nowhere. They are not simply unplaceable,
outside of time and space, they inhabit the disjunction between
experiences of place and moral order..." (Hetherington, 1998)
Travellers and members of the wider counter-culture, are more
likely to explain their motivation along the lines described by
Miranda in No Boundaries (Dearling, 1998):
"For me, being a Traveller is about side-stepping
the boundaries that the state tries to fence us in with. Some
of the boundaries are obvious, like national borders, but others
are implanted in our heads, encouraging us to be narrow-minded
about the unfamiliar."
Clark, (in Acton, 1997) says that there are "media-inspired
myths and stereotypes about them (New Travellers) as a group."
Blaydon, (in Acton, 1998) is quoted as saying, "The media
either portray Travellers as ‘medieval brigands’ or
as ‘victims’." My contention is that the
academicising process, with increasing numbers of university courses
and research papers may not be adding to the ‘demonising’
of new Travellers, but it may well be further ‘problematising’
their existence. In this way, the media and some researchers and
writers are potentially collaborating in a complex distortion
of the Traveller lifestyle. Whilst the media may continue to call
on new Travellers to ‘get a life’, and point to the
problems they pose to society, many of the Travellers want to
celebrate the fact that even against the odds, and in adversity,
they have ‘got a life’ already! There’s even
the contention that the Criminal Justice Act helped bring together
many disparate groups such as eco-rads, squatters, Gypsies, hunt
saboteurs, ravers, festival goers and new Travellers, and politicised
them. (see McKay, 1996 and McLeish, 1995, quoted in McKay):
"In seeking to criminalize such lifestyles
the State has succeeded in politicizing them."
At this point, I’ll share some of the words and phrases
which I’ve either read or heard used to describe new Travellers
in the past few years. In their own way, perhaps they offer some
pointers to the problems associated with researching a group of
people in society, who are by no means homogeneous by outlook,
lifestyle or cultural background.
‘Got a life’ Travelling as a solution ‘Get
a life’ Travelling as a problem
environmentally friendly or/ dirty, contagious and a health
hazard
housing solution or/ scrounging welfare benefits
inclusion in a real caring community or/ should be marginalised
and excluded
making a statement with attitude or/ incomprehensible behaviour
visionary and utopian or/ damaged misfits and criminals
challenging social norms in the way they live or/ threat
to societal norms
sustainability and low impact or/ damage to natural areas
part of a tradition of nomads, entertainers and festivals
or/ part of a reprehensible section of beggars, thieves, Gypsies
and vagabonds
job creation or/ unemployed
environmental campaigners or/ dangerous protestors
The list would be easy to extend. Try it! For many who are, or
have been part of the Traveller community, it is one which has
offered many rewards which are hard to quantify: freedom; friendship;
variety; opportunity to travel and interact with people in different
countries and cultures; a chance to learn new skills such as woodland
crafts or circus and performing skills; and ‘natural’
environments for bringing up and educating children. (Dearling,
1997).
A changing world
Books like my own; Travellers: Voices of the New Age Nomads
(Lowe and Shaw, 1994); Senseless Acts of Beauty (McKay,
1996); Gathering Force (Searle, 1997), Fierce Dancing
(Stone, 1996); and magazines such as Squall, SchNEWS, Frontline,
Festival Eye, Greenleaf and Stonehenge Campaign Newsletter
have all described how much the Traveller scene has quickly evolved
during the 1990s. Arguably, the arrival of rave and the environmental
protestors has provided the biggest impetus for change. Not all
of the 1970s and 1980s Travellers have welcomed this infusion
of new blood and ideas. Older organisation such as TSC and FFT
have had to look again at who they exist to serve. There are many
elements which have been stirred into the new Traveller ‘pot’.
Now, towards the end of the 1990s, radical action, drug culture,
dance, sound systems, festivals, spirituality, squats and vegetarianism,
environmentalism, feminism, and adopting a world-view, are amongst
the elements which make up the lifestyle and culture
which is the new Traveller world. And, as ever, the real people
who inhabit this world, if indeed it is a single entity, represent
a wide spectrum of interests and backgrounds. The mix is even
greater than existed in the days of the Peace Convoy in the 1980s.
Many more people drift into Traveller-type lifestyles because
it is one of the only communities which will offer some level
of support and sympathy for the urban dispossessed; those suffering
from multiple problems of deprivation, and those damaged by institutionalisation,
whether it is in children’s homes or the armed forces.
Writing in what she calls the ‘Contradiction’ at
the beginning of Copse: a cartoon history of road protesting,
Evans (1998) says:
"HIS-STORY:...It is only the dominant form
of history written by bourgeois white liberal males entrenched
in the universities and the media that claims to be objective.
This book (Copse) is subjective history, spoken history, a history
of resistance, and history in resistance."
Surely it is up to researchers to act as a mirror so that members
of these richly diverse communities can have their own voices
heard? The new Travellers now have a history of their own and
that society has its writers (Earle, 1994 and in Dearling, 1998)
and artists such as Kate Evans (1998) and Gubby (in Dearling,
1998) and photographers, artists, musicians, and crafts-people
(for instance, Big Green Gathering and Squall). As new members
join the ever-widening Traveller fraternity, the lifestyle of
traditional Gypsies as well as new Travellers from the past decades
will help to inform their lives, in addition to the positive and
negative motivations that these individuals themselves bring to
their travelling.
Researchers do have a role to play, but in partnership, and in
enabling. New Travellers, like traditional Travellers and Gypsies,
should be assisted, and not in a patronising way, to make their
own representations and make sense of their own lives and lifestyle.
Neither new nor traditional Travellers want researchers in the
next millennium creating their own versions of reality, as was
done by the Gypsy Lore-ists such as John Sampson, whereby he invented
a ‘purer’ form of the Gypsy Romani, to make up for
the deficit which he perceived in the spoken language of Gypsies
he observed! It is an age old conflict between real life, oral
tradition and the academicised representation of that life. (Lee,
1998) New Travellers have got their lives already!
References
Acton, T. (1997) Gypsy politics and Traveller identity University
of Hertfordshire
Acton, T et al. (1998) Land, People and Freedom National Council
for Voluntary Organisations
Alderson, P. (1995) Listening to Children Barnardo’s
Bence-Jones, M. (1995) 1994 CJA and dominant attitudes towards
Travellers unpublished dissertation (location not known)
Blaydon, B. (1998) Asserting changing identities in Acton. T.
Land, People and Freedom National Council for Voluntary Organisations
Blumer, H. (1969) Symbolic Interactionism Prentice Hall
Carey, J. (1998) Fresh Flavour in the Media Soup Squall Web site
Dearling, A. (1997) Almost everything you want to know about
the Travellers’ School Charity Travellers’ School
Charity
Dearling, A. (1998) No Boundaries: new Travellers on the road
(outside of England) Enabler Publications
Do or Die Collective (1998) Do or Die 7 Earth First!
Earle, F et al. (1994) A Time to Travel? An introduction to Britain’s
newer Travellers Enabler Publications
Evans, K. (1998) COPSE: a cartoon history of road protesting
Orange Dog Publication
Friends and Families of Travellers Support Group (1996) Confined,
Constrained and Condemned FFT
Friends and Families of Travellers Support Group (1996) A Traveller’s
Guide FFT
Hammersley, M and Atkinson, P. (1995) Ethnography: Principles
in Practice Routledge
Hetherington, K. (1992) Stonehenge and its festival in Shields,
R Lifestyle Shopping Routledge
Hetherington, K. (1996) Identity formation, space and social
centrality in Theory, Culture and Society Vol. 13 (4) 33-52
Hetherington, K (1998) Vanloads of Uproarious Humanity in Skelton,
T and Valentine, G Cool Places Routledge
Hurley, N. (1998) Straight Talk Joseph Rowntree Foundation/York
Publishing
Lee, K. (1998) Orientalism and Gypsylorism presentation at the
University of Greenwich conference
Lowe, R and Shaw, W. (1993) Travellers: Voices of the New Age
Nomads Fourth Estate
McKay, G. (1996) Senseless Acts of Beauty Verso
Stone, C.J. (1996) Fierce Dancing: adventures in the Underground
Faber and Faber
University of Hull (n.d.) Participatory Appraisal: Workshop Proceedings
University of Hull
Searle, D. (ed.) (1997) Gathering Force The Big Issue
Thomson, T. (1997) Traveller Friends, Families of Travellers
Support Group |