From outsider to insider status: Constructing an authentic social self

Abstract

This article explores community based modes of engagement employed by a variety of support workers providing, amongst other things, employment advice and guidance to marginalised youth living within a small rural community setting. The paper sets out to demonstrate that such key workers are better able to promote understanding, transmit social norms and act as a positive role model, when they set-aside their applied disciplinary knowledge and objectives. However, since social inclusion is essentially performed, I will argue that role modelling and strong relationships with key workers, though important pre-cursors for change, are insufficient to sustain transitions to independent living, employment or training for marginalised youth. As such, key workers need to use their relationships with young people to help build social and cultural capital and, moreover, identify activities that make a meaningful contribution to identifiable social group objectives, since this leads to peer recognition and the development of an authentic social self.