Pathways to care: how superdiversity shapes the need for navigational assistance. Health and Illness, 36(8)
Sociology of
ABSTRACTThe recently developed sociological concept of superdiversity provides a potentially interesting and useful way of developing an understanding of life in contemporary Europe. Here we report on research based on individual narratives about access to healthcare, as described by a range of people from very different socio-cultural backgrounds in four European countries. This paper notes the frequent appearance in first person narratives of the need for navigational assistance in the form of knowledge, cultural completence and orientation that facilitate the identification and use of pathways to healthcare. Our dataset of 24 semi-structured interviews suggests that, in the context of needing healthcare, the feeling of being a 'stranger in a strange land' is common across a wide range of backgrounds. In social settings characterised by transnationalism and cultural heterogeneity, understanding the need for navigational assistance, particularly at times of uncertainty, has potential importance for the design and delivery of health services. The relationship between the inhabitants of contemporary Europe and the healthcare systems available in the places they live is dominated by both complexity and contingency -and this is the cultural field in which navigation operates. (187 words)
In the introduction to this special volume the editors focus on the analytical value of “political subjectivities” in emergent social fields that are characterized by multiple diasporic overlaps. They emphasize the central role played by various forms of governance in producing, confirming and contesting politics of transnational incorporation and diasporic participation and consider how these political projects often target members of historically differently situated groups. In particular, they draw attention to moments of exclusion and non-incorporation. The analytical concept of political subjectivity helps to understand how people relate to governance and authorities. It denotes how a single person or a group of actors is brought into a position to stake claims, to have a voice, and to be recognizable by authorities. At the same time the term points to the political and power-ridden dimension within politics of identity and belonging, encompassing the imaginary as well as the judicial-political dimension of claims to belonging and citizenship.
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