The central focus of this paper is the notion that the home can provide a locale in which people can work at attaining a sense of ontological security in a world that at times is experienced as threatening and uncontrollable. The paper builds on and develops the ideas of Giddens and Saunders on ontological security and seeks to break down and operationalise the concept and explore it through a set of empirical data drawn from interviews with a group of older New Zealand home owners. The extent to which home and home life meets the conditions for the maintenance of ontological security is assessed through an exploration of home as the site of constancy in the social and material environment; home as a spatial context in which the day to day routines of human existence are performed; home as a site free from the surveillance that is part of the contemporary world which allows for a sense of control that is missing in other locales; and home as a secure base around which identities are constructed. The paper also argues that meanings of home are context specific and thus the data need to be seen in relation to New Zealanders' long standing pre-occupation with land and home ownership. The paper concludes by speculating on how meanings of home may be changing.

This article discusses the uses and benefits of an innovative method of graphic elicitation; timelining. The method was developed in the context of a narrative-based research project on fatness and weight loss. Participants’ weight over time was plotted on a graph, informed and elaborated by a variety of material objects such as photographs, diaries, and medical records. The timeline provided a focus for participants and prompted their stories of weight loss experiences over time. While initially intended as a simple heuristic tool for eliciting talk, over the course of the research the process of timelining became a central feature of the project. Timelining is a subtle and malleable research method. While keeping time in view, timelining documents, records, extends and deepens understandings of participants’ past experiences. It encourages the construction of rich temporal narratives. It also provides opportunity for a deeper researcher-participant relationship to develop. This form of graphic elicitation has particular value for narrative forms of research.

This article foregrounds the complex connections between property and law in the multi-owned residential sites which are becoming increasingly common in many countries. Empirical research into intensive housing developments in New Zealand and gated communities in England found that, despite differences in legal structures, individual owners often expressed frustration at their lack of control over the on-going management of such developments. This article suggests an analytical framework for considering and explaining issues of power and control amongst developers, residents and managing agents of these sites. We use the concept of the 'bundle of rights' approach to property interests and ownership to explore the importance of the right to manage. Drawing on the work of Foucault, Bourdieu, Clegg and Callon, the article tracks the transfer of power and legal rights through the critical legal events identified as taking place in the process of development and sale of multi-owned residential sites. It is suggested that these analytical tools might be useful in illuminating power relationships and legal arrangements in other urban property configurations.

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