Urban roots and national belonging: hierarchies and scales of belonging in London

作为英国人、英国人、伦敦人，或者简单地说，“本地人”是什么意思？这些身份是如何产生、想象和维持的？他们包括谁，不包括谁？在英国性和归属问题处于公共和政治辩论前沿的时候，我的研究为分裂和过度简化的辩论提供了重要的纠正，这些辩论将人们定位为民族或非民族，宽容或种族主义，并且忽略了英国白人中产阶级体现，延续和调整关于“英国性”是什么以及谁/什么是其中一部分的正常化想法的方式。我的研究重点是在英国白人中产阶级之间的边界和归属等级的再生产，我的研究创新了围绕移民融合，国家归属和英国性的讨论，突出了一个新的研究议程，重点关注在这些过程中建立的大多数人的作用，并揭示了英国性的种族化性质和历史想象在塑造当前归属观念中的意义。这是政策制定者经常忽视的一个事实。该奖学金将为我提供必要的时间，使我成为一名具有良好出版记录的早期职业学者，并为我在不断变化的英国中继续就国家、身份和归属感进行高质量、有影响力的研究奠定基础。我将通过学术出版、传播和影响来巩固我的博士工作，并将开始制定未来的研究计划，通过伦敦家族史的民族志来扩展我的工作。这些活动围绕着三组相互关联的研究问题来组织：1)英国人和当代英国人的身份是如何或在多大程度上被种族化的？“种族”在承认和归属的政治中扮演什么角色？“种族”是如何与亲缘关系的概念联系起来理解的？2)移民和少数族裔以何种方式、在何种程度上有可能融入英国，并归属于更成熟、更占主导地位的群体？归属是如何在层次和尺度上被理解和复制的？3)历史和家谱的想象在塑造对归属的理解（国家和地区）中的作用是什么？特别是，归属的等级是如何通过时间上的关联和归属的概念再现的？学术产出将包括3篇经同行评审的文章（每套研究问题各一篇，全部用于高级社会科学期刊）和3篇会议论文（与期刊文章相关，以支持传播）。除了会议论文，传播活动将包括3个政策简报，3个博客和3个短视频，所有这些都强调了我的研究结果在英国退欧背景下的影响。这些传播活动将与研究问题相关，并将重申以下关键发现：(1)白人继续标志着英国性的核心理念，即使“英国性”的边缘正在模糊；(2)在整合和归属的过程和政治中存在权力不平等；(3)关于过去的观念，包括关于家谱关系和帝国的观念，在现在再现了等级归属概念。该奖学金提供了一个真正的机会，提高公众和政治对英国等级制度和权力结构的归属感的认识，这在“脱欧英国”的背景下至关重要，英国显然对多元文化和移民两极分化感到焦虑。它通过对我博士工作中确定的最独特和种族化的归属形式的民族志调查，促进了我博士工作的扩展，并促进了我向学术生涯的过渡，将确保我在移民地理学先锋的研究的继续。

What does it mean to be British, English, to be a Londoner, or simply 'local'? How are these identities produced, imagined and maintained? Who do they include and who is excluded? At a time when questions of Britishness and belonging are at the forefront of public and political debate, my research provides an important corrective to divisive and over-simplified debates that position people as either national or non-national, tolerant or racist, and which overlook the ways that white British middle-class people embody, perpetuate and adjust normalised ideas about what 'Britishness' is and who/what is part of it.With a focus on the reproduction of boundaries and hierarchies of belonging among the white British middle-classes, my research innovates the discussion around migrant integration, national belonging and Britishness by highlighting a new research agenda focused on the role of the established majority in these processes and reveals both the racialised nature of Britishness and the significance of historical imaginaries in shaping ideas of belonging in the present, a fact often overlooked by policy-makers.The fellowship will provide the necessary time to establish myself as an early career academic with a strong publication record and to build a basis on which I can continue to deliver high quality, impactful research on nationhood, identity and belonging in a changing Britain. I will consolidate my doctoral work through academic publication, dissemination and impact, and will also begin to develop plans for future research extending my work through ethnography of London-based family histories. These activities are organised around three interrelated sets of research questions:1) How, or to what extent, are Britishness and contemporary British identities, racialised? What role does 'race' play in the politics of recognition and belonging? And, how is 'race' understood in relation to notions of relatedness?2) In what ways, and to what extent, are possibilities for migrants and ethnicised minorities to integrate and belong in and/or to Britain meditated by more established and dominant groups? And, how is belonging understood and reproduced hierarchically and across scales?3) What is the role of historical and genealogical imaginaries in shaping understandings of belonging - national and regional - in the present? And, in particular, how are hierarchies of belonging reproduced through ideas of relatedness and belonging in time?Academic outputs will include 3 peer-reviewed articles (one related to each set of research questions and all intended for high-ranking social science journals) and 3 conference papers (related to journal articles to support dissemination). In addition to conference papers, dissemination activities will include 3 policy briefings, 3 blogs, and 3 short videos, all stressing the implications of my findings in the context of Brexit. These dissemination activities will be related to the research questions and will reassert the following key findings: (1) Whiteness continues to mark core ideas of Britishness, even while the edges of 'Britishness' are blurring; (2) There are power inequalities embedded in processes and politics of integration and belonging; and (3) Ideas about the past, including about genealogical relatedness and Empire, reproduce hierarchical conceptions of belonging in the present.The fellowship offers a real opportunity to increase public and political awareness of the hierarchical and power-laden construction of belonging in Britain, something that is crucial in the context of a 'Brexit Britain' apparently anxious about multiculture and polarised over immigration. It facilitates the extension of my doctoral work through ethnographic investigation of the most exclusive and racialised form of belonging identified in my doctoral work and, in facilitating my transition into an academic career, will secure the continuation of my research at a vanguard in migration geographies.