INDAGACIÓN POR OTROS SENTIDOS DE LA RECONCILIACIÓN

Not all of the residents I met had remained in Hiraeth from childhood. Some had had periods away with work, such as Phil (previous section), some moved to neighbouring suburbs before deciding to move back, and others had grown up in another part of the city before moving to Hiraeth for the long-term. It was not uncommon for people who had left Hiraeth to feel the pull to return, anchoring them to the community. I met Cathy through volunteering at the local scouts’

hall, and she was intrigued about my research into families living in Hiraeth. This fieldnote extract highlights the importance that returning to Hiraeth had for Cathy:

Cathy seemed bemused about what I was doing, after I explained my work she started to tell me that she’s lived in Hiraeth all her life, apart from moving away for two years to [neighbouring suburb] before coming back. She has her mum nearby as well. She said that she wants to stay in Hiraeth and that she owns a house now in Hiraeth because she wants her children to have the same upbringing and community as she did. She told me she knew of people who had been priced out of Hiraeth because of increasing housing prices which was a shame.

(Fieldnote 02.10.2017) As discussed in Chapter Three, class as defined by stratification scholars using socioeconomic data such as income, occupation, and education tends to forget “that it is actively engaged in the formation and establishment of the class hierarchies that it describes” (Tyler 2015, p.499). Although Hiraeth is a community that could be described as working-class based on its socioeconomic status, it may be easy to assume that as the majority of participants in this study are homeowners, they must be among the more ‘middle-class’ residents of the community. However, this ignores the dynamic and relational nature of social class, which is a site of political struggle, “rather than… a set of static and empty positions waiting to be filled by indicators such as employment and housing” (Lawler 2005, p.430). The political struggle demonstrated here by Cathy (and other ‘born and bred’ residents) is the need to secure and maintain permanent housing in Hiraeth, which could be seen as a protection against the precarity and uncertainty that neoliberal society brings, providing comfort and security (Minton 2009; Paton 2013; Jeffery 2018). The political struggle of resisting individualism makes way for a model of personhood based on relationality, providing ontological security through relationships with others, anchored in one community (Skeggs 2011; Studdert 2016; Walkerdine 2016).

Cathy was not the only one to mention the rising property prices in Hiraeth, with some parts seen as more ‘desirable’ than others (see Chapter Six), and some plots of land that are awaiting private development. For Cathy, a move back into the area was achievable, which was essential for her as she wants her children to grow up in the same community as she did, providing consistency and continuity to the generational born and bred narrative (Taylor 2010). As ‘regeneration’ slips into the surrounding suburbs, it will not be long before this has a further knock-on effect on the availability of affordable housing options in Hiraeth (Minton 2009). This in turn demonstrates why such value is placed on the born and bred narrative, as family homes provide an anchoring and security to both kinship ties and place.

The pull to return to Hiraeth, seen as a hometown and a place of safety and belonging, came across in several residents’ narratives either through describing family members’ eventual return home, or their own journey back to the community. Diane discussed how her brothers have returned on the road to home:

Diane: …yes, because I’ve got one brother who lives across the road from me [LF: Really?] yes *laughs* [LF: Close by!] close by, we did have one who lived in Carmarthen Road [LF: mhm] but then he sold and he bought a bungalow off, um, Rhoose Road by Fieldview [LF: Yeah], and he’s only been there two years and it’s up for sale, he wants to come back to Hiraeth [LF: really?] yeah. My other brother had a big property in [neighbouring suburb] which he just sold, so he’s back in Hiraeth as well

LF: They’re coming back! *laughs*

Diane: They’re coming back yes, the only one who’s not back is my eldest brother, but I don’t, he’ll never come back to Hiraeth but um, my other brothers, our Steve he got his up for sale cos he misses Hiraeth [LF: aww], he’s got a beautiful bungalow, done a lot to it but um, he misses, being in Hiraeth [LF: really?] and you find a lot of people that grew up in Hiraeth always seem to come back [LF: yeah], yeah.

Diane constructs her brothers’ movements away from Hiraeth as associated with loss and separation through phrases such as “he misses Hiraeth” indicating the strong attachment to place. Despite the fact that her brother Steve has “a beautiful bungalow” and has “done a lot to it”, the aesthetics of his property do not equate to the satisfaction of returning home. Diane further suggests that this is a common occurrence (echoing Phil’s observation in the previous section)- “you find a lot of people that grew up in Hiraeth always seem to come back”. Therefore, homecoming and place-attachment play a role in the narratives of those who move away. Kathryn, who as a young woman moved to London to complete her nursing training, before returning to Hiraeth some ten years later, reinforced this narrative:

Yeah, yeah, yeah it did feel, it does feel like home, it’s always felt like home, yeah, cos I’ve got friends that have moved away, well, Clive’s sister, she lives in Manchester, she’s been in Manchester for twenty years, she no longer considers this home [LF: mm] but I’d only been away for, ten years [LF: mm] so yeah, it did feel like coming home [LF: mm] and, d’you know, in places like London they don’t understand happy Welsh girls [LF: *laughs*] you get, you thank the bus driver here don’t you? [LF: yeah, yeah] you always, you try thanking the bus driver in London, they’re like, you’re mad, absolutely mad! *laughs*

Kathryn’s narrative constructs this move back home using temporal boundaries and devices. She begins by correcting herself, “yeah it did feel, it does feel like home”, before emphasising it has “always” felt like home. She then predicates her attachment to home through length of time spent away, as her husband’s sister has lived away for twenty years and so “she no longer considers this home” whereas Kathryn has “only been away for, ten years”, thus allowing her to claim that Hiraeth still feels like home and that she still has a strong attachment to place. Unlike many other residents I spoke to, Kathryn had the experience of living in another city which allowed her to construct her difference to those living in London- “in places like London they don’t understand happy Welsh girls”. This again provides her narrative with the strengthened notion that she belongs in Hiraeth, although she did tell me she enjoyed living in London, Hiraeth was, and still is, home.

5.3.5. Meanings made-in-common: Local discursive resources for describing the