Citation

Kane M. Polit. Geogr. 2023; 102: e102843.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2023, Butterworth-Heinemann)

DOI

10.1016/j.polgeo.2023.102843

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Austerity erodes the foundations of our being and stunts the modalities of our becoming. This paper turns towards the austere materialities of decomposition, through the out-of-place presence of mould in the home, to document the violence of the austere housing crisis. Through an empirical engagement with the housing worlds of private and social renting tenants across the central belt of Scotland, I build upon geographical concerns with precarious home ownership, and the loss of material 'things', and begin to explore the decaying materialities of homes not-yet ours in ways that highlight how austerity is felt through the growth of, occupation by and presence of material 'things', in this case mould. By bringing into conversation housing studies and the geographies of violence, I introduce the concept of the 'violent uncanny' - the changing relation(s) between (non-)human actants through the collapsing of spatial ecologies that reshape 'known'/normative (spatial) relations between material things. In so doing, three broader contributions are made: (1) the paper engages with the housing crisis violently, arguing for the importance of using the language of violence, (2) it adds to existing work on austere materialities, thinking about the ways in which austerity materially 'presents' itself, in order to render visible aspects of austere living that remain hidden from view and (3) it introduces a new theoretical concept to interpret how austerity is experienced within the home. Together, these contributions seek to foreground the political importance of documenting lived precarity to expose austerity for what it is: violent.

Language: en

Keywords

Austerity; Housing; Materiality; Mould; Out-of-place; Uncanny; Violence