Homelessness in discourse, narrative and interaction

在英格兰，目前有78，000个家庭住在临时住房中，9，000个家庭住在简陋的露宿者中。日益严重的无家可归问题已经得到了慈善机构和组织的认可，《卫报》和《观察家报》最近发出呼吁，筹集了超过125万英镑帮助无家可归者。在我的博士研究中，我将研究无家可归者如何通过他们的互动和他们讲述的故事来构建个人身份。我打算将联合收割机框架与小故事叙事方法相结合，以探索我在剑桥做志愿者的无家可归者是如何使用日间中心来构建身份的。社会语言学认为，在特定的语境中，说话者的身份是有限的，这取决于他们的社会语言资源和相对于周围人的社会权力。因此，那些与无家可归者互动并处于更大权力位置的人（如日托中心员工）的话语实践将影响无家可归者构建的身份。因此，分析不仅无家可归的人之间的互动，而且无家可归的人和日间中心的工作人员之间的互动，是至关重要的研究身份是如何位于更广泛的机构话语。我将联合收割机与叙事分析相结合。正如我们讲述的故事帮助我们理解我们的社会世界一样，叙事是构建我们身份的一种方式。尽管在疾病等领域对叙事和身份进行了广泛的研究，但在无家可归者的身份，互动和叙事方面的工作有限。虽然身份可以通过其他符号学手段来描绘，如物质财产，但通过这些手段构建的身份范围对无家可归者来说是有限的。当贫困限制了身份建构的资源时，关于自我的叙述可能在身份建构中发挥更重要的作用。我将使用小故事的叙事方法，它认为身份是通过在我们与他人的互动中讲述的共同建构的叙事建立起来的。将这种方法与互动社会语言学相结合，将证明身份的建构，并展示他们与机构和公共话语的关系。我的研究问题如下：（一）无家可归者如何通过他们的互动和他们讲述的故事来协商不同的身份？(b)无家可归者的身份如何定位在更广泛的无家可归的公共话语中，正如日间中心内外的话语所证明的那样？我的数据收集将在剑桥的一个日间中心进行。我将从人种学的角度观察那些使用该中心的人以及工作人员，通过三角方法收集数据，包括记录群体互动和实地记录。将对这些数据进行分析，以研究身份的相互影响。除了日间中心工作人员的互动外，中心话语的证据将来自收集文献（例如传单和网站），并使用语言民族志方法对其进行分析，这些方法主张在分析身份建构时纳入更广泛的机构话语。我将从多个来源收集数据，即国家报纸的媒体文章，学术期刊的研究文章和近年来发表的政策文件。数据将使用语料库方法进行分析，例如搭配和关键词，以确定证明无家可归的语言模式。

In England there are currently 78,000 families living in temporary housing and 9,000 rough sleepers. The growing homelessness problem has been recognised by charities and organisations, with a recent appeal by The Guardian and The Observer raising over £1.25 million to help those who are homeless. For my PhD study, I will research how homeless people construct personal identities through their interactions and the narratives they tell.I intend to combine the frameworks of interactional sociolinguistics and the small stories approach to narrative to explore how identities are forged by homeless people who use a day centre in Cambridge where I volunteer. Interactional sociolinguistics maintains that a finite set of identities is afforded to speakers in given contexts, limited by their sociolinguistic resources and social power relative to those around them. Thus, the discursive practices of those who interact with homeless people and are in positions of greater power, such as day centre employees, will influence the identities that the homeless people construct. Therefore, analysing interactions not only between homeless people, but also between homeless people and day centre staff, is vital for examining how identities are situated within wider institutional discourses. I will combine this approach with narrative analysis. As the stories we tell help us to make sense of our social world, narratives are a way of constructing our identities. Despite extensive research into narrative and identity in fields such as illness, there has been limited work on identity, interaction and narrative in homelessness. While identities can be portrayed through other semiotic means, such as material possessions, the range of identities constructible via these means is restricted for those who are homeless. When poverty limits identity-building resources, narratives about the self may take on a more significant role in the construction of identities. I will use the small stories approach to narrative, which argues that identities are built up through co-constructed narratives told in our interactions with others. Combining this approach with interactional sociolinguistics will evidence constructions of identities and demonstrate their relationship with institutional and public discourses.My research questions are as follows:(a) How do homeless people negotiate different identities through their interactions and the narratives they tell?(b) How are the identities of homeless people situated within the wider public discourses of homelessness, as evidenced by discourses within and outside the day centre?My data collection will take place at a day centre in Cambridge. I will ethnographically observe those using the centre as well as the staff, collecting data via a triangulated method including recorded group interactions and field notes. The data will be analysed to examine the interactional construction of identity. As well as the interactions of staff at the day centre, evidence for centre discourses will come from collecting literature (e.g. leaflets and websites) and analysing it using linguistic ethnography approaches that argue for the inclusion of wider institutional discourse in the analysis of identity construction.To examine how the discourse from the day centre is situated within the wider public discourses of homelessness, I will collect data from multiple sources, namely media articles from national newspapers, research articles from academic journals and policy documents published in recent years. The data will be analysed using corpus methods, such as collocation and key words to pinpoint linguistic patterns that evidence the construction of homelessness.