Abstract
Narratives of failure surrounding social housing and residents are often perpetuated by private developers, councils and the media to justify programmes of regeneration.
Against the background of the housing crisis in the UK, where financial stability is now increasingly connected to home ownership, these narratives serve to portray social housing and council estates as sites of deprivation, and the residents as inextricably tied to this failure. Additionally, narratives of failure hide the reality of displacement and dislocation that is very often the consequence of regeneration, as these schemes become gentrification.
This thesis focuses on the way in which communities facing the threat and precarity of gentrification and displacement feel forgotten and disenfranchised. The practice research is grounded in socially engaged performance and uses this to explore how existing residents of social housing feel ignored in favour of potential wealthier future populations.
The research asks how the practice of space in areas of social housing can be explored to generate narratives of home in theatre for social change, and how this performance and creative engagement can consider the value of strategic intervention in order to more fully challenge the power geometries surrounding gentrification. The research spans three iterative practice projects, engaging with residents of areas of social housing impacted by the negative effects of regeneration. Using practices of walking and mapping, the research develops a resident-led practice for generating narratives of home, holding them as a counter to prevalent narratives of failure.
The outcomes of this practice and the insights from the primary research, further show the potential for a softer strategic approach to socially engaged performance, advocating for long-term embedded and iterative engagement with residents, in order to meaningfully counter narratives of failure and to demonstrate the resilience of these housing models.