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Identities: Global Studies in
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Nomads and mobile places:
disentangling place, space and
mobility
Pet er Kabachnik
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Polit ical Science, Economics, and Philosophy, College
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Available online: 10 May 2012
To cite this article: Pet er Kabachnik (2012): Nomads and mobile places: disent angling
place, space and mobilit y, Ident it ies: Global St udies in Cult ure and Power, 19: 2, 210-228
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Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power
Vol. 19, No. 2, March 2012, 210–228
Nomads and mobile places: disentangling place, space
and mobility
Peter Kabachnik
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(Received June 2011)
Though there is a danger that ‘place’ may become subsumed or ignored in
research as attention now shifts to questions of ‘mobility,’ discussion of place
has burgeoned throughout academia. Many texts declare that place is important, or proclaim the power of place. While place has been shown to be a
fundamental part of human existence, what does this then mean for those
who are characterized as not being interested in places? Examining nomadic
Gypsies and Travelers in Britain, who are often constructed as placeless, highlights that this is not simply a representational concern, but has a tangible
empirical affect, impinging on their everyday practices as well as influencing
policies and laws that actively deny them their right to place. By exploring
various definitions of place and how this impacts the understanding of mobilities, I demonstrate that the meaning ascribed to nomads is dependent upon a
spatialized definition of place which is underpinned by the space-place binary.
It is this aspect of the discourse that allows for nomads to be constructed as
out-of-place wherever they are, and by recognizing this we can avoid framing placelessness as a natural characteristic of nomadism. Reconceptualizing
place allows for more nuanced understandings of nomadism, as our identities
are constructed in relation to both place and mobility, not just one or the other.
Keywords: Mobilities;
placelessness
place;
Gypsies
and
Travelers;
nomadism;
While it is somewhat common to hear ‘place’ mentioned in work by geographers
today, this was not always the case (Daniels 1992, Curry 1999). However, in the
past three decades, discussions of place have proliferated in geography, anthropology and elsewhere (Feld and Basso 1996, Gupta and Ferguson 1997, Appadurai
1988). Many texts declare that place is important or proclaim the power of place;
however, as Sack (2003) states, there is a need to go beyond mere pronouncements.
When there is elaboration on the topic, attention is given to place as a context for
human action, the role of place in everyday life and the idea that we are always in
places.
Portions of this article are derived from my dissertation completed in 2007 in the
Department of Geography at the University of California-Los Angeles (UCLA).
ISSN 1070-289X print/ISSN 1547-3384 online
© 2012 Taylor & Francis
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1070289X.2012.672855
http://www.tandfonline.com
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Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power
211
Despite this recent emphasis on place, there is a danger that place may become
subsumed or else ignored in research, as attention now shifts to mobility and processes of deterritorialization. However, it is not just deterritorializations that occur,
but reterritorializations (Hannam et al. 2006). The mobilities literature has repeatedly called for the consideration of moorings alongside mobilities. The increased
mobilities of the contemporary era are reliant upon extensive moorings – the places
that allow for the production of mobilities – that connect networks of places that
facilitate various movements and are themselves co-constituted through mobile
practices. Identities are constructed in relation to both place and mobility, not just
one or the other.
Yet, what does this mean for those who are characterized as not being interested
in places? If place is so vital for human practices, and such a central organizing
feature of our lives, then what does this mean for those characterized as placeless,
such as the homeless and nomadic groups? The Roma, better known as Gypsies,
are perhaps seen as the quintessentially placeless and exemplify this precarious
position. Their lack of place, which derives from their mobility, is constructed as
an integral part of their identities and ways of life. Being labelled as not valuing
place is not simply a representational concern, but has a tangible empirical affect,
impinging on their everyday practices as well as influencing policies and laws
that actively deny them their right to place. We can see this quite clearly in the
contemporary situation of nomadic Gypsies1 and Travellers2 in England and Wales
(Clark and Greenfields 2006). Since it still has a sizeable nomadic population –
estimates range from 45,000–100,000 (Hawes and Perez 1995, Kenrick 2004) –
Britain provides a unique opportunity to examine how the nomad is constructed.3
Just as the hypermobility of the cosmopolitan business traveller cannot occur
without a series of places dedicated to potential and actual movement and travel,
such as airports and hotels, the mobile practices of nomads necessitate a variety of places without which their mobilities are severely altered and/or restricted.
The lack of a sufficient amount of legal caravan sites for the entire travelling
community creates a situation where Gypsies and Travellers have to face ever
stronger pressures to cease their nomadic practices and ‘settle down’ while having
to endure living on land that is not zoned for caravan site use, thereby criminalizing their identities and the nomadic way of life. Thus, paradoxically, we find
policies and practices that continuously displace them, which then further reinscribes and validates the image of placelessness. This situation reveals that there
are severe negative repercussions when people are labelled as nomads. I will use
Gypsies and Travellers as an example to illustrate the impact of certain conceptions of place and mobility which help to deny them places and construct them
as placeless. The response of nomadic Gypsies and Travellers to their treatment
in England and Wales, and especially their involvement in a series of legal actions
about places, suggests that places may be more important for them than many have
been ready to concede and that mobility and place are interdependent.
For Roma, even though most are sedentary, the nomad stereotype has plagued
them for centuries. There had been a long running argument in the annals of the
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P. Kabachnik
Journal of the Gypsy Lore Society about whether a Gypsy ceases to be a Gypsy if
he/she is no longer nomadic. The association is so strong that the term Gypsy itself
has come to mean ‘nomad’. Because of the strong association between nomadism
and Gypsyness, a settled Gypsy is considered a paradox or an oxymoron (Clark
and Greenfields 2006, p. 12). Furthermore, the attention paid to their mobility
ignores that much of their movement may be forced due to the lack of (legal)
places where they can put a caravan, coupled with the intolerance and discriminatory attitudes held by English residents that seek to have them moved on. The
conflation of the identity of Gypsies and Travellers with that of nomads, coupled
with a lack of understanding of travelling ways of life, leads to the idea that nomads
do not care about or need places. Why are Gypsies and Travellers so often characterized as placeless? To answer this question, we need to analyse how place,
space and mobility are conceptualized. The placelessness attributed to Gypsies
and Travellers is not an isolated example, as various people’s mobilities have been
curtailed by the state for centuries (Noyes 2000, Cresswell 2006), and is a crucial line of inquiry that illustrates many critical facets of the concept of place. The
meaning ascribed to nomads is dependent upon what I term a spatialized definition
of place which is underpinned by the space–place binary. This allows nomads to
be constructed as out-of-place wherever they are, and by recognizing this we can
avoid framing placelessness as a natural characteristic of nomadism.
Below, I begin with a discussion of how place has been conceptualized
recently. I will examine various definitions of place, paying particular attention
to what I call the spatialized definition of place. Interlocking conceptions of space
with the conceptions of place have many repercussions and influences our conceptions of mobility, such as causing nomads to been seen as placeless due to
the space–place binary. Next, I examine some general remarks on the relationship humans have to places, which already points to the need to discredit ideas of
‘placeless Gypsies’ – or a placeless anyone for that matter. Then I discuss how the
mobility of nomads is constructed.
Exploring place
Place has been the subject of considerable academic debate, both within and
outside of geography, 4 since the 1970s, albeit after quite a long hiatus (Curry
1999, Cresswell 2004), where place was not simply ignored but also devalued
(Agnew 1987). Yet despite this recent attention, I suggest that in many accounts
place still remains an underdeveloped concept, often undefined or simply assumed
and taken for granted. Even in studies that discuss the notion of place, one can
identify several different versions of the definition of place5 or else a very limited
definition is proffered.6
How do I define place? Place is the context for all human activity. Place is
a powerful influence in our lives, though by no means is it deterministic. Place
matters so much in all of our daily practices because place is the crucial context
for those very actions (Entrikin 1991, Curry 1999, 2002b). Places are important
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Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power
213
centres for meaning (Tuan 1974, Entrikin 1991, Cresswell 2004), emotive and
strongly linked to our memories (Entrikin 1997, Thrift 1999). Places both constrain and enable people to do what they do (Sack 2003). It is the context where
those practices and activities make sense and where they derive their meaning
from (and, relationally, those practices and activities give meaning to the place as
well). Though constructed, places are no less real, in the sense that they are out
there, but we can only know them through our meanings that we construct and the
experiences that we have (Richardson 1984).
Place also enables subject and identity formation, as the self and place are
mutually constitutive (Entrikin 1991, Sack 1993, 1997, 2003, Entrikin 1997,
McDowell 1997, Casey 2001a). Identity is not some uniform trait or bundle of
characteristics that remains consistent everywhere, but shifts according to the different places and social situations we find ourselves in. Indeed, what we do is
remarkably correlated with where we are – not in the sense of latitude and longitude, but whether we are in a classroom, our bedroom, at work or in a crowded
elevator. Our identities shift according to the places we are in, exemplifying the
role place plays in identity formation and performance.
We must avoid some of the pitfalls when talking about place. Places are not
merely settings (Entrikin 1997) or contexts nor are they simply outcomes (Massey
1984, Agnew 1987). The relationality of place reveals that places are not isolated
entities and are not backdrops upon which the social occurs. Places are relational, interconnected with other places (Agnew 1987, Massey 1993, Entrikin
1997, Curry 1999, Thrift 1999). Furthermore, places can be anywhere. We can
be in multiple places at once (Casey 1993, Curry 1999, 2002b). Places can be
at any scale (Tuan 1974, Curry 2002a, Sack 2003). Places can be stationary or
moveable (Langer 1953, Casey 1993, Sack 2003, Hannam et al. 2006). This last
point – that places can move – is commonly overlooked and often undermined
by those talking about place. It is this notion that provides the key element in
the reconceptualization of place and allows for a more nuanced understanding of
mobility.
Conceptualizations of place
The definition of place has mutated, from what has been termed the conventional,
or traditional, essentialist view, which sees place as static, bounded and having
an essence, to a more nuanced conception that is dynamic, relational and antiessentialist, which has been referred to as, following Massey (1993), the progressive view. The traditional view of place, while highlighting the importance of place
for human experience, tended to universalize. Places were seen as tightly bounded
and fixed, so places were treated as containers. In this conception of place, exclusion flourishes. When reactionary and xenophobic attachments to place are made,
this conception of place is being utilized. It also invites the idea of authenticity,
leading many to fear change while upholding an ideal image of their place.
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P. Kabachnik
Several theorists have problematized this notion of place as being too narrow,
instead positing a ‘progressive’, or global, conceptualization of place. In this antiessentialist view, places are conceptualized as relational and changing. Places are
not isolated, autonomous entities, but rather fluid and interconnected to many other
places. This is not to suggest that the world is now an endless horizon of flows and
networks, because as Cresswell notes, places and boundaries still matter, even in
today’s globalized world, ‘just not in the ways we once thought’ (2003, p. 20).7
Despite the advent of this perspective, most people operate under the essentialist
definition that they decry.
However, what unites both of these (over?) generalized perspectives is the
failure to fully conceptualize the relationship between place and mobility. The
reassessing of mobility and place, and their constitutive relationship, has been
one of the major developments in attempts to theorize place in the past 25 years.
In her attempt to destabilize and deconstruct fixed and essentialist notions of
place, Massey (1993) posits that mobility, both within and between places, shapes
places. Yet much geographical work that considers mobility ‘often assumes a stable point of view, a world of places and boundaries and territories rooted in time
and bounded in space’ (Cresswell and Merriman 2011, p. 4). Similarly, de Certeau
(1984) explicitly illustrates the vital role of people’s everyday mobilities in the
production of place. The mobility of people – their mobile bodies performing the
tactics and practices of everyday life such as walking through the city – helps
to challenge and disrupt the normative order and intended functions and roles of
places. Pedestrian practices, that is, the manner in which they walk, their pace, the
routes they take, the shortcuts they make, are integral processes that produce the
city they are in. Yet, de Certeau contrasts the mobility of urban nomads with the
stability and fixity of place, which still reproduces binaries.
Acknowledging the mobility of places allows for a nuanced definition of place,
one that gets us past the usual criticisms of the conventional model of place, that it
is static, bounded and fixed. But why has mobility been seen as incongruous with
discussions of place? To attempt to answer this, I turn to the space–place binary as
the source of this difficulty.
A place in space?
The most common way that place is connected to space is in the notion that place
is a location in space or a part of space. This spatialized definition of place, which
fixes place to a location, muddles attempts at a better understanding of the mobility of places. For much of human history, and despite the advent of GPS, GIS,
MapQuest and Google Earth, for many contemporary practices, location in space
is not a necessary facet of experience (Curry 2002a). The experience of place and
the relationality of places all prove more influential than the mere detail of location. The most significant feature of place that challenges a spatialized version of
place, where place is seen as a node in space, is that places move, and need not be
fixed in one spot.8
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Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power
215
To help clarify how it is that places can in fact move, a few examples are in
order. Think of a cruise ship, a Winnebago, or a car for some people on a road
trip or for someone who is using it as a home. We can look to the past for the
‘wandering capitals’ of Ethiopia (Horvath 1969) or to the future, with several proposed cities at sea.9 Both reveal that mobile places need not just constitute a small
group of individuals, but can make up populations of 20,000–100,000 people. The
mobile camps of nomads and the trailers of Gypsies and Travellers in Britain and
Ireland are particularly relevant examples. Caravans and tents, it turns out, are
legitimate homes, and this example shows that home, as the quintessential place,
need not be in a fixed location (Douglas 1991). Mobility and immobility need to be
better conceptualized to avoid stark dichotomies. Otherwise, place is represented
as a part of space and the space–place binary remains.
Why has mobility been seen as incompatible with representations of place?
The answer lies in the aligning of mobility with space and the reproduction of
the space–place binary. Instead of discussing space and place separately10 (though
often influencing each other and, as I am stating, repeatedly entangled), they are
understood as necessarily integrated terms which recapitulate the binary and confine the role of place. Tuan (1974), for instance, in his seminal statement on space
and place, clearly advocates this dichotomy.11 For him, and others, mobility undermines the potential of place formation. A street is not a place, until movement
stops, and it is ‘transformed into a centre of festivities, with people milling around
in no particular direction, it becomes non-directed space – and a place’ (Tuan 1974,
p. 236). Space is about mobility, while place is about stability and being fixed in a
location.
This point of view is pervasive, but can be rebuked by examining nomads.
Careful attention to nomadic practices makes evident the important dialectic
between mobility and place. To ignore this allows for the acceptance of the images
of nomads moving through space and of sedentary people who sit around their
places, enjoying stability and rootedness, to predominate. Instead, as the conflicts
over caravan sites in England demonstrate, places are integral for nomads. Gypsies
and Travellers are fighting for their places – places to stay the night, places to
travel to and places to live (for extended periods of time).12 Conversely, mobility
has been shown to be a very important aspect of the experiences and identities
of sedentary people. Thus, space need not enter the picture, and the space–place
binary can be dismantled.
The spatialized definition of place
One commonality, with few exceptions, between the traditional and the progressive conceptions of place is the reliance on a spatialized definition of place.13
Simply put, a spatialized definition of place defines place with reference to space.
Geographers, whatever their definitional proclivity, have referred to place as ‘a
portion of geographic space’ (Johnston et al. 2000, p. 582); ‘space invested with
meaning in the context of power’ (Cresswell 2004, p. 12); the ‘conceptual fusion of
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P. Kabachnik
space and experience’ (Entrikin 1991, p. 6); and ‘meaningful segments of space’
(Cresswell 2006, p. 3). We are also told that ‘each home is a place in space’ (Sack
1997, p. 16) and ‘we must transform space into places for us to exist’ (Sack 1997,
p. 265, n. 7); that ‘place represents the encounter of people with other people and
things in space’ (Agnew 2005, p. 84); that ‘in general it seems that space provides
the context for places’ (Relph 1976, p. 8); that by making a sculpture ‘mere space
is transformed into place’ (Tuan 1975, p. 161); and that ‘spaces become places as
they become “time-thickened”’ (Crang 1998, p. 103). Anthropologists define it in
a similar fashion and see place as meaning ascribed to space (Carter et al. 1993,
p. xii) or a peculiar form of space (Dirlik 1999, p. 152).
Can we define place as an integral part of human experience and also think of it
as a location in space? Or are these ideas mutually exclusive? Tuan recognized that
if place is defined as location, it gets ‘subsumed under the geographer’s concept
and analysis of space’ (1974, p. 213). Yet this is precisely how place is normally
defined. In both popular and scholarly accounts, it is evident that conceptions of
space are heavily relied on when defining place (Casey 1997, 2001b) since place is
routinely defined in terms of a spatial framework. Even when people proclaim that
our lives are not dependent on map grid reference points, and exalt the importance
and richness of place, a spatial definition of place is still used (see Cresswell 1996,
Crang 1998). This reliance on a spatial element in their definition, even if it is only
a part, and in actuality not a vital part, of their argument illustrates that space acts
as a vestigial holdover in definitions of place. Consequently, the world we live in
becomes first and foremost a spatial one. Does this assumption merely create the
unintended consequence of devaluing place or is it a more deep-seated error? Does
place come first or does space? And does it matter?
Few have challenged the idea that place is not merely a portion of space.
However, there is an alternate view that claims that the concept of place is more
fundamental than the concept of space (Casey 1996, 1997, Curry 2002b). This perspective prioritizes the fact that we live in a world of places (Curry 2002b, Casey
1993). If place is to be defined as a part of space, then the implication is that
places are inherently derivative of space. Yet as Casey (2001b) maintains, there is
no need to seek an inherent connection between space and place. Place has ‘no
privileged relationship to that [physical] space, either by way of exemplification or
representation’ (Casey 2001b, p. 405).
The inversion of the place–space nexus is not simply a reversal of the previous
model. That would recapitulate the hierarchy, the difference being with place now
atop, and reproduce the idea of two camps: those who advocate space and those
who prefer place, emulating the debates between quantitative and humanist geographers in the 1970s.14 On the contrary, correcting the error of spatializing place
does not imply that space is unimportant or an unworthy area of research. Instead,
the point is to disentangle narratives of space and place, so as to better understand how the concepts are constructed and involved in human practices, rather
than conflating the terms, deprioritizing one over the other or intertwining them in
inappropriate ways simply to avoid the other two errors.
Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power
217
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Exploring mobilities
I now will illustrate how these discussions are relevant to better understand mobility by turning the focus to nomadism. Because ethnographic research on nomads
was lacking, with few in-depth studies using participant observation until the late
1950s and early 1960s (Dyson-Hudson 1972), ‘what a nomad is’ was – and is –
usually taken for granted.
However, nomadic and sedentary ways of life are not mutually exclusive
categories (Misra 1986). This dichotomy ignores the variety and complexity of
nomadism and settled life alike (Salo 1986) and fails to acknowledge a sedentary–
mobility continuum. For example, Niner (2003) notes a threefold system of local,
regional and long-distance travel. David Mayall (1988) delineates four different
types of nomadic practices. At one extreme, there are habitual wanderers who have
no regular settlements and continuously move from place to place. Then there are
those who move for most of the year, but winter in towns. Next, he lists those who
travel only in the summer. Finally, at the other end of the continuum, we have people who make frequent local trips, though they never move far from their home
base. It is precisely the recognition of these nuances of nomadic practices that is
overlooked in the general or metaphoric conceptions of the nomad. The mobility
of sedentary people also needs to be highlighted (Flusser 2003). Just as there are
variations of mobility within nomadism and nomads settle often, for sedentary
people mobility is a central part of their lives.15
With the advent of the new16 mobilities paradigm (Urry 2000, Cresswell 2006,
Hannam et al. 2006, Sheller et al. 2006a) along with other work that places mobilities as a central element of analysis, scholars have provided a burgeoning field of
research (Bærenholdt and Simonsen 2004, Sheller et al. 2006b, Urry 2007, Uteng
and Cresswell 2008, Adey 2010, Bissell and Fuller 2010, Edensor 2010, Elliott and
Urry 2010, Cresswell and Merriman 2011). Recently, scholars in the new mobilities paradigm or mobility turn have begun to move past the traditional binary
oppositions of mobility and place. I will not provide a detailed review of the vast
literature on mobilities,17 but instead highlight some of the main issues relevant
for this study. As Easthope (2009, p. 66) contends, while there has been research
that invokes the nomad metaphorically and abstractly and considers everything as
mobile, the idea of placelessness or the diminished importance of place is often
derived from cursory readings or misunderstandings of the work of scholars like
Bauman and Giddens. As Bauman relates:
The fashionable term ‘nomads’, applied indiscriminately to all contemporaries of
the postmodern era, is grossly misleading, as it glosses over the profound differences
which separate the two types of experience and render all similarity between them
formal and superficial. (Bauman 1998, p. 87)
For Bauman, one must look at the privileged mobilities of the ‘tourist’ and the
limited mobilities of the ‘vagabonds’. Hence, there are a multitude of meanings
and ways to experience mobilities that are situated in unequal power relations.
Furthermore, the current trend in mobilities research considers various mobilities ‘in relation to forms of place, stopping, stillness and relative immobility that
218
P. Kabachnik
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are enabled by or enable mobilities’ (Cresswell 2010b, p. 552). Thus, studying the
places that enable movement, mobility and migration, and the places and identities
constructed by mobile practices, has become a critical focus for research (Fortier
2000, Conradson and Latham 2005, Hannam et al. 2006, Easthope 2009, Gielis
2009, Cresswell 2010a).
All forms of mobility require places (Crang 2002, Urry 2003, Adey 2006,
Hannam et al. 2006). Places are produced through mobilities, and mobilities produce places. First, we are all in places, be it a cruise ship or a car speeding down
a highway. Even at the fastest speeds, such as in an airplane at 30,000 feet, one is
in emplaced. Second, we move in and between and through places. According to
Cresswell and Merriman,
mobilities also need spaces in which to enact mobility – roads, the air, the sea, railway
lines, bridges. These spaces have their own grammar which can direct or limit mobility. They produce structural or infrastructural contexts for the practising of mobility.
They are agents in the production of mobilities. (Cresswell and Merriman 2011, p. 7)
Third, a vast network of places – moorings – are required for mobile practices.
For instance, automobiles need parking spots and gas stations and ships require
ports. The airplane, arguably the ‘most powerful mobile machine . . . requires
the largest and most extensive immobility, of the airport city employing tens of
thousands of workers’ (Urry 2003, p. 125). Gypsies and Traveller caravans or
mobile homes are places, and as they move from one caravan site to another,
they move through a myriad of places, and this mobility is dependent upon available caravan sites, which function as the network of places to facilitate nomadic
practices.
English Gypsies and Travellers that practice a nomadic way of life travel occasionally throughout the year or else remain mostly in one place but choose to live
in a caravan rather than in a ‘bricks and mortar’ home and have had to face a
significant decrease in the amount of places that can legally accommodate them.
Post Second World War, England has witnessed increased pressure on nomadic and
semi-nomadic Gypsies and Travellers, stemming from the implementation of laws,
the expansion of the real estate industry and racism and discrimination. Two laws,
the 1960 Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act and the 1968 Caravan
Sites Acts, drastically restricted where Gypsies and Travellers could stop for the
night, for a few weeks or live for extended periods of time. While the 1968 Act
did include a provision to provide caravan sties, local authorities did not follow the
recommendations as they were not compelled to do so by the national government.
This situation became even more dire with the passing of the 1994 Criminal Justice
and Public Order Act, which removed the (rarely followed) obligation of local
authorities to provide caravan sites and ‘designated’ the entire country, beyond the
already existing approved caravan sites, off limits for those practicing a travelling
way of life. Thus, if an individual or family did not have a legal site to stop on,
they were automatically committing a criminal offence, punishable by eviction,
fine, prison and/or confiscation of caravans.
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Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power
219
Because of the shortfall of legal caravan sites, the 1994 Act effectively criminalizes travelling for one-third of the caravan-dwelling population in England and
Wales. Though many Gypsies and Travellers still travel regularly, or else would
prefer to if possible (and thus require a more extensive network of transit sites),
most caravan-dwelling Gypsies and Travellers want a permanent caravan site,
where they would stay most of the year and use as a base to occasionally travel
for work, weddings or festivals.
Without the ability to depend on council sites, Gypsies and Travellers turned
to private caravan sites as their only viable option. This led to a proliferation of
cases where, upon the advice of the government,18 Gypsies and Travellers have
purchased land and built permanent facilities for living, only to be issued eviction notices for not receiving the proper planning permission for land that they
themselves own. Since there are not enough caravan sites, their only recourse is to
attempt to get a legal private caravan site by gaining retroactive planning permission through the appeals process.19 These legal actions illustrate the lack of access
by Gypsies and Travellers to legal places, itself an expression of the view that
wherever they are, they are out of place (Sibley 1981, Halfacree 1996). Although
there have been some successful cases, as judges have begun to recognize that
they have no legal place to go, this has led to protracted legal battles, media attention, local hostility and insecurity for Gypsies and Travellers. As Kenrick and
Clark (1999) remind us, not all Gypsies and Travellers can afford to purchase
land and some people travel regularly and thus require transit sites. Furthermore,
the process takes years, requires large amounts of money for legal fees and its
outcome is uncertain, providing instability about whether one will be allowed
to continue to live in their home free from disturbance and threat of eviction.
Issues of everyday anti-Gypsyism and institutionalized racism as described here
are gaining greater attention as a variety of supranational organizations, such as
the European Commission against Racism and Intolerance, the Committee on the
Elimination of Racial Discrimination and the Council of Europe, are recognizing the pervasiveness of these discriminatory attitudes and policies throughout
Europe.
Exclusion from place and annihilation of their homes and stopping places are
two common tactics used against Gypsies and Travellers. If the planning appeal
is lost, highly publicized evictions take place, such as the well-publicized standoff at Dale Farm, where, after 10 years, over 80 families were evicted in October
2011. Dale Farm, once the largest caravan site in the United Kingdom, became
a dominant headline in the months leading up to the eviction, eliciting bitter
emotions and serving as a polarizing issue. Media representations consistently feature Gypsies and Travellers as ‘place invaders’ (Kabachnik 2010b), and rhetorical
devices such as ‘battle’ and ‘fight’ were common elements in the coverage of Dale
Farm. This helped to heighten tension as people awaited the seemingly contradictory confrontation at Dale Farm – that of ‘nomads’ defending their ‘place’. During
evictions, caravans are seized and impounded, fences and chalets are destroyed and
many people are forced back on the road and/or to other illegal sites. The work
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P. Kabachnik
of displacing families is conducted cooperatively, at huge taxpayer expense, by
riot police and private bailiff companies. Destroying their places undermines their
basic human needs and their attempts to settle and/or live a nomadic way of life
and further reinforces that they are placeless, which then makes it easier to justify
exclusion and evictions. However, it is not only that Gypsy and Traveller rights
are denied occasionally, such as in these well-publicized evictions, but as several studies and organizations (e.g. The Equality and Human Rights Commission)
repeatedly demonstrate, exclusion and racism pervade nearly every aspect of their
lives (Clark and Greenfields 2006, Cemlyn et al. 2009)
The caravan site issue illustrates that ‘moorings enable movement’ (Urry 2003,
p. 126); without access to these places, Gypsy and Traveller mobilities are limited
and disrupted. However, lack of moorings produces movement as well. Gypsy and
Traveller mobilities do not only diminish in the light of practices and policies that
work at decreasing the number of moorings available to them. Their movements
may increase due to being constantly ‘moved on’ by authorities because of the
lack of sites. The lack of moorings also produces different rhythms and patterns
of Gypsy and Traveller mobilities due to forced movement and displacement. This
alters traditional and preferred routes taken, the places selected to park their caravans and the duration of travel and stopping. Not only can their movements be
forced, and hence unwanted, but where they stop may be unsuitable, and despite
this fact, they choose to remain for a prolonged period due to the fear of being
unable to find any other option.
For centuries, the British state has regulated nomadism (Mayall 1988). The
state’s spatial management of Gypsy and Traveller mobilities is intended to preserve the spatial order (Bancroft 2005) and was designed to sedentarize and
assimilate Gypsies and Travellers (Mayall 1988, Home 2002, Greenfields and
Smith 2010). Consequently, there are increases in both forced mobility and forced
sedentarization. While being sedentary does not negate Gypsy or Traveller identity, as most Gypsies and Travellers do live, or have lived at times, a sedentary way
of life, whether one chooses to cease moving or whether one becomes sedentary
due to harassment and lack of options is an important distinction to make. For
some, living in a house is a temporary measure, while for others it is a last resort.
The difficulty of adapting to ‘bricks and mortar’ homes for the unaccustomed has
been well documented (Greenfields and Smith 2010) and is another example of
the repercussions of restricting Gypsy and Traveller mobilities. Their place- and
homemaking practices are transformed, due to their displacement from caravan
sites, and many cannot adapt successfully to non-caravan homes.
Gypsies and Travellers and the denial of place
As Easthope (2009) demonstrates, both mobility and place are integral for identity
construction. Instead of seeing mobility and place as opposed, it is important to
see them as deeply imbricated in one another. Yet for Roma the myth of the placelessness predominates, and place is denied as a component of their identities. For
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Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power
221
instance, to take an example from Italy, Sigona (2003) discusses the reception of
Kosovo Roma during the late 1990s. These individuals were labelled nomads. This
was done not because the label was accurate, nor simply to reproduce the common
stereotype of Roma as being nomadic, but to actually remove their refugee status.
Within this blatantly sedentarist logic (Malkki 1997), in order to be a refugee, one
needs to have a place, in order to then be displaced. So here a nomad is by definition quintessentially placeless, and therefore he/she can never be a refugee, since
the nomad has no home – no place – to which to return. This pernicious form
of categorization helps shape Italian popular opinion to avoid any responsibility
to provide aid to these ‘fake refugees’. Those who are displaced, as in the case
of refugees, may not be welcomed, but they may be viewed sympathetically due
to their forcible removal from their homes (which implicitly shows how place is
positively valued). However, to be rootless is not understandable and marks one as
pathological (again, they are seen as inferior because of their lack of place). It is
this association with placelessness that renders nomads inferior.
The conventional understanding of Gypsies and Travellers is that they are supposed to move. The myth of placelessness proves damaging when it legitimizes
practices that deny places to Gypsies and Travellers. There has been substantial
resistance to Gypsies and Travellers who attempt to travel in the summer and
settle in a place for the winter (MacLaughlin 1995, p. 76, Home 2002). This misunderstanding of nomadic ways of life is predicated on the dominant image of
mobility.
On a BBC website where comments are posted in response to the situation
regarding illegal caravan sites, ‘Mike’ states that ‘By definition, any “traveller”
who wants to build a permanent residence (whether house or pitch, etc.) is not a
traveller’! (BBC 2005). ‘Andy’ continues: ‘If they build something permanent on
the land then surely they are no longer travelers’ (BBC 2005). That this proves
disturbing is shown in views which state that ‘while gypsies [sic] trumpet the right
to roam, they sometimes seem keener to stay still’ (Gerard 2006). Paradoxically,
what this suggests is that what is at issue may be more than their mobility. Since
they are being prevented from settling down, concern is expressed about them not
moving. This is unnerving because it challenges stereotypical representations of
those living a nomadic way of life by revealing their attachment to place. This
is significant for two reasons. First, it problematizes the idea that it is solely the
mobility of nomads that proves so disruptive to settled people. Second, the importance of place is highlighted. We can see the normativity of place clearly at work,
because Gypsies and Travellers become a pressing problem simply because they
are here, and even more importantly, here to stay (Curry 1999).
What I suggest is that it is not mobility per se that proves so unnerving to
those espousing sedentarist logic. Instead, I emphasize place (or more specifically,
the absence of place or being seen as having a deficient relationship to place) to
be the main factor in the othering of nomads, and indeed in the construction of
the nomadic/sedentary binary. There are two aspects that I highlight with regard
to the concept of place. First is the idea that nomads are placeless, and the ways
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P. Kabachnik
in which that representation affects them. Second is that place is an integral part
of nomadism, despite presumptions to the contrary. Gypsies and Travellers are
seen as having the wrong relationship to place. But what is it that allows nomads
to appear to not have any connection to place? John K. Noyes illustrates that the
Germans thought the nomadic Herero were uncivilized because of their ‘inability to develop an emotional attachment to land’ (2000, p. 51). Likewise, Gypsies
and Travellers are seen as inferior, not because they move, but because they have
deficient connections to place, eschewing local attachments and rootedness.
MacLaughlin (1995) explains that in the nineteenth century those who supported bourgeois property rights othered nomadic groups precisely because they
were propertyless. They were seen as challenging the hegemony of territorial and
property arrangements. At the same time, German geographer Ratzel asserted that
sedentary societies should be given first priority to exploit the world’s resources,
since their approach to environmental management was superior to that of nomads
(MacLaughlin 1995, p. 26). L.P. Curtis argued that Saxons, because of their deep
attachment to the land, were better than nomadic Celts (MacLaughlin 1995, p. 27).
Noyes identifies this trend in nineteenth century theories of nomadism, stating that
there has been a
long tradition of regarding wandering as an unmediated response to landscape and
environmental constraints, rather than as a rational system of land utilization. (2000,
p. 48)
In the contemporary context, the response to Gypsies and Travellers, as found in
British newspaper accounts, reproduces the very same image (Kabachnik 2009).
The narratives of the English claim the mobile nomad to be placeless and acknowledge place to be a highly important ideal, though one that they relegate solely to
the domain of the sedentary. Not only is place seen as not being a part of the
nomadic way of life but also place is utilized as a dominant trope in the narratives
used to other and exclude Gypsies and Travellers in England.
The reliance on the space–place binary allows for Gypsies and Travellers to
be constructed as placeless. By aligning mobility with space, nomads are denied
places, the very places that are important for nomadic ways of life but often get
represented otherwise. Thus, by disentangling space and place the experiences
of those living a nomadic way of life can be more accurately represented and
discussions of mobility can more adequately capture the role of place.
Conclusions
Narrow conceptions of place lead to abstraction in the attempts to define and represent nomads that proliferate today. The privileging of space over place denies
nomads their relationship to places. However, no one moves over a flat grid with
points for places; we move in and through three-dimensional places. The placelessness attributed to nomads is not just an empirical error of definition that
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Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power
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affects their representation but also helps reinforce discrimination and hinders life
chances.
The focus on (a certain idea of) mobility deflects attention from the real reason
for the perception that Gypsies and Travellers are inferior. Their placelessness is
not an essential feature of nomadism. On the contrary, critical ethnographies of
nomadic groups reveal the importance of place for them (Kabachnik 2010a). The
placelessness ascribed to nomads is a result of their having been constructed as
mobile wanderers with no interest in place coupled with various strategies used to
disrupt the places that are important for nomads and facilitate the nomadic way of
life. Whether through legal means of eviction and segregation or through pogroms,
violence and direct hostility, the places of nomads are removed and even destroyed.
The hegemony of sedentary ways of life is made all too apparent.
The focus on movement also deflects attentions from the lack of places and
from the forced mobility of many Gypsies and Travellers. By equating nomadism
with any movement, forced movement gets subsumed under the expected practices
of these groups. Thus, intolerance and exclusionary practices are ignored.
I suggest that place is integral to the nomadic way of life. This is also the
case for sedentary English, though this should not be surprising. Indeed, place
is the central feature of anti-caravan site rhetoric. English residents invoke place,
in various ways, and simultaneously focus on the mobility and placelessness of
Gypsies and Travellers to justify their exclusion. This, in turn, reinforces the idea
that nomads are solely about mobility, not place. It also represents the current
conflicts over caravan sites as if it were perfectly natural for there to be antagonism
between sedentary and nomadic ways of life.
In closing, the reluctance to attribute place as an important feature of nomadic
ways of life and the denial of mobility as a characteristic of place, both of which
are thoroughly discredited notions within much of the new mobilities paradigm,
are dual processes that further obfuscate conceptions of place. As my title suggests, the fact that place can be mobile highlights the limitations of relying on a
spatialized definition of place and allows one to separate the discussion of place
from the narratives of space and mobility with which it is increasingly entangled
and confused with.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their helpful suggestions. Michael Curry
also provided me with valuable comments on earlier versions of this article. The usual
disclaimer applies. Support for this article was provided by a PSC-CUNY Award, jointly
funded by The Professional Staff Congress and The City University of New York.
Notes
1.
While many Roma prefer to call themselves ‘Roma’ and find the label Gypsy demeaning, Gypsies in England and Wales self-ascribe as Gypsy and that is how I will refer
to them.
224
2.
3.
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4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
P. Kabachnik
The term Gypsies and Travellers encapsulates English Gypsies, Welsh Gypsies, Irish
Travellers, New Travellers, Scottish Travellers and so on. In the British context, when
discussing nomadic ways of life and/or perceptions of nomadism, all these groups
are relevant to examine as not only are they often confused with one another but they
can all attain ‘Gypsy status’ within planning law due to their caravan dwelling and
nomadic practices.
This article is foremost a conceptual exploration, with the case of Gypsies and
Travellers to be used for illustrative purposes, not as the central focus that would
necessitate drawing on deeper ethnographic data and analysis.
My focus on geographer’s definitions of place is not to imply that place is the sole
domain of geography as a discipline. Instead, because place, as a concept and term,
is one of the main themes that geographers draw upon, geographers have provided
the most discussion and definitional attempts. Though place has entered into the formal conceptual lexicon of disciplines like cultural studies and anthropology since the
1980s, there are still many times, since other frames of analysis, in part due to disciplinary histories, are utilized, the role of place is rendered invisible and overlooked
(see Kabachnik 2010a).
This leads to misunderstandings and to what Curry (2002a) has termed discursive displacement, where multiple meanings are being understood by various
readers/participants. Someone will use a term, with a particular meaning in mind,
but another person will understand it as meaning something else entirely, leading to
ambiguity, slippage and ultimately confusion.
Space is often used interchangeably with place. De Certeau (1984) actually switches
space with place, using the term space when clearly talking about place. The definition of Deleuze and Guattari’s (1986, 1987) ‘smooth spaces’, Lefebvre’s (1991)
‘social space’ and Soja’s (1996) ‘third space’ align with place as well.
This stance is similar to Gilroy’s (1993) notion of anti anti-essentialism, enabling one
to avoid essentializing place, while at the same time not reducing place to mobility
and flux and denying its materiality.
Out of all the characteristics of the more nuanced theorizations of place that have
been postulated as of late, this facet is still the most commonly overlooked and
inadequately addressed.
See www.freedomship.com and English (2011).
Or as Casey refers to them, as ‘two different orders of reality’ (2001b, p. 404).
While not conflating space and place, nor ignoring one over the other, Tuan and many
others, including Entrikin (1991), Sack (1997) and Agnew (2005), advocate adopting
a middle ground, emphasizing the important aspects of both concepts, while accentuating the important interrelationships between them. This, I contend, still upholds the
binary and relies on a spatialized model of place.
Both conceptions of place, the traditional and the progressive, are utilized by Gypsies
and Travellers.
This reveals that approaches to place are still informed by the legacy of positivism
(see Curry 1996).
See Agnew (2005) for an excellent overview of the core issues in the place–space
debate.
It is not just people – but objects – that are mobile. See Urry (2007, p. 45) for
delineation of the various mobilities and immobilities of objects.
As Cresswell states (2010a, b), we must be wary of exaggerating the newness of the
new mobilities paradigm, which overemphasizes the mobilities generated by modern
communication and transportation technologies.
For a summary of the recent mobilities literature, see Cresswell (2010b).
This was found in government Circular 1/94, Gypsy Sites and Planning.
Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power
19.
225
Applications by those qualifying for ‘Gypsy’ status are denied 90% of the time,
though this lowers somewhat upon appeal. In contrast, non-Gypsies have an 80%
approval rate (ACERT and Wilson 1997).
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PETER KABACHNIK is Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science,
Economics and Philosophy at the City University of New York, USA.
ADDRESS: Political Science, Economics, and Philosophy, College of Staten Island –
CUNY, 2800 Victory Blvd 2N 230, Staten Island, New York 10314, USA.
Email: peter.kabachnik@csi.cuny.edu