Ethnomethodology and the Non‐representational: What Are Disaffected Young White Men Capable of?

Abstract

AbstractThis short review draws together three research trajectories underway in contemporary human geography; ethnographic research with young white men living out changing urban contexts, non‐representational styles of thinking and experiments with ethnomethodological precepts and research practice. The article begins by examining the possibility of rapprochement between non‐representational and ethnomethodological thought. This unlikely meeting is applied to the possibility of an empirical engagement with young white men in Burnley, UK. In his report on the summer 2001 disturbances in Northern England's mill towns, Ted Cantle signals the political problem presented by ‘disaffected’ young white men. However, a generic concept of disaffection presents an obstacle to connecting those men, as capable individuals, to positive political futures. In response, this article speculates that studying the varied affective capacities behind disaffection will multiply the ways in which young white men may be recognised as capable political actors. The meeting of distinctive critiques of empiricism will enable an ethnographic approach well placed to generate understandings of how a variety of capacities to think, feel and act come to matter amid politically unsettled, post‐industrial urban environs.