La interacción de las personas con el medio tecnológico

Visiting the refuges was a unique experience. I was aware of their existence but not their locations and I was surprised to find that one was within walking distance of my home, indeed, I had walked past it countless times, never knowing its purpose. There were two refuges, one accommodating up to eight women; the second accommodating six. Together, the refuges accommodated up to twenty-five children. Staff explained to me that the larger refuge (Refuge A) was first utilised as a refuge facility in the 1960s. It contained a laundry room in the basement and a children’s play room that was closed for safety reasons. There was a large kitchen with several mismatched fridge-freezers and cookers and a huge table in the centre of the room. A large living room consisted of two settees and number of smaller armchairs, a large television and some games consoles. The first and second floors consisted of the bedrooms, shared bathrooms and the staff office. There was a small, neat garden to the rear. The smaller refuge (Refuge B) had similar facilities but was purpose built in the 1980s and had a more homely feel. The lounge was smaller than in Refuge A but had matching furniture, a few decorative items on the walls and a bookcase of paperback novels. The open-plan kitchen/dining room was situated in the basement and I was surprised to see that the kitchen cabinets, although more modern than those in Refuge A, were grey in colour, giving the room a rather dingy feel. The manager read my expression and commented “not the nicest kitchen.”

Refuge B appeared to accommodate women with toddlers and young children while Refuge A, whether by design or coincidence, accommodated older children. This gave each refuge a markedly different atmosphere. Refuge B was mostly calm and quiet whereas Refuge A was noisy and lively, particularly as my visits coincided with the summer holidays when the children were off school.

Staff members at the refuges were very welcoming and interested in my study. They were pleased that research was being undertaken with the women they worked with every day, reflecting the lack of enquiry relating to domestic abuse in Salford. Staff members seemed to

value the study for its therapeutic potential but also for the clear message it would give about the need for ongoing funding, the reduction or withdrawal of which was a constant fear for staff. After my first visit, staff members spoke to every single resident and actively encouraged them to participate. The manager was keen to show me round both refuges and she and other staff members described routine procedures. Every day, the refuges are contacted by a Women’s Aid helpline worker to enquire about vacancies. Each resident has her own key worker who offers weekly one-to-one sessions to provide practical and emotional support in order to help residents plan their futures. The manager explained that many refuges around the country have had restrictions placed on them owing to loss of funds. As a result, numerous authorities insist that a considerable number of places are reserved for women who live in that authority. The manager pointed out the problems caused by this new policy as many women need to move out of the locality for their own safety and are now restricted from doing so. At the time of my involvement, no such restriction had been imposed on Salford’s refuges. The manager explained that the locations of the refuges were highly confidential. Not even the police knew of their whereabouts, something that surprised me and made me feel privileged that I had been so warmly welcomed. The anonymous and confidential nature of refuges causes inherent difficulties in being able to openly research such locations, however, this ethnographic study required immersion in the field and presented an opportunity for these refuge workers to talk about the importance of refuge provision while also acknowledging the limitations for notoriously underfunded facilities. Conducting ethnographic field research enabled the production of rich descriptions of refuge life without jeopardising the confidential locations of facilities or the safety of women and children.

The manager described the difficulties of refuge life for its residents. Women arrived in a range of physical and emotional states and had to share one bedroom with their children, regardless of age. Children were often distressed at leaving behind beloved family pets which were not

permitted at the refuges. Sharing a relatively small living space with a number of other women and children was not without its problems and there were often disagreements over household chores. Waiting for housing was one of the most difficult aspects for residents who found it hard to move on emotionally while prevented from moving on in a physical sense. The manager explained that women living in refuges can apply to live anywhere in the country and their applications are treated as priority, however, housing provision is scarce in all authorities, often resulting in agonisingly long periods of waiting. Knowing how hard it was for many of the residents to endure refuge life, far from questioning why women stay in abusive relationships, the manager often wondered “why would you leave?” This comment was significant in demonstrating staff members’ deep understanding of financial and housing problems as well as the emotional challenges for residents. The comment also suggested a high degree of empathy that clearly facilitated a non-judgmental environment in which residents’ emotional well-being was as important as their safety. The passion staff had for their work came across vividly in the descriptions of their day-to-day roles, their frustrations in dealing with systemic limitations and delays and their warm and friendly interactions with residents and their children. The manager poignantly commented that she and her staff were “inspired every day”

by the strength and bravery of the women they supported. I recognised that this study was not only contributing to the telling of women’s inspirational stories but also recognising the invaluable work undertaken by SIDASS and Women’s Aid workers.

Interviews undertaken in the communal lounges at both refuges were markedly different from those at the Women’s Centre where interviews took place in the same room in which the group sessions were held. The group room was spacious, airy and contained comfortable armchairs which made it an ideal place for long interviews to be held. There were no time constraints as the room was available for as long as necessary. The room was quiet and interviews proceeded without interruptions. This contrasted with the interviews undertaken at the refuges. Three of

the participants had young children who were present in the room while the interviews were taking place, a necessity as there were no alternative childcare arrangements available or other spaces to use. The interviews held at Refuge A proved to be quite challenging. The lounge was large and noisy and this was not without its difficulties. The residents’ children were told by staff to vacate the lounge so that the interviews could take place. One boy, aged ten, was distinctly unhappy as he wanted to play computer games on the television in the lounge. Towards the end of the first interview, he simply walked into the lounge and announced “it’s my turn.” The interview had just come to an end and I asked staff if there was an alternative room available. I was informed that there was not unless I wished to interview women in their bedrooms which I felt would have been intrusive and inappropriate as they were the only spaces the women did not have to share with anyone else. A worker asked the boy to leave the lounge for the next interview and he reluctantly agreed. He then moved a chair from the kitchen and sat outside the lounge door, staring at me through the door window for the duration of the interview. Although almost comical at the time, I was very aware that the refuge was effectively this child’s home and I was preventing him from accessing the room that provided most opportunities to relax and undertake activities. This captures the overall lack of privacy and autonomy that families in refuges have to endure. As an ethnographer, my presence inevitably had implications for residents and I necessarily interacted with everyone I came into contact with which impacted on their ability to access all spaces within the building while I was there. The worker later said to me that she had been glad of a reason to prevent the boy from playing computer games and to play outside in the garden instead, signalling the limited activities available and potential for boredom for children in such facilities.

I found the interviews where participants’ young children were present challenging as an interviewer. Understandably, the children wanted some attention from me and this was difficult because my primary focus was the women. One child proceeded to empty an entire bookcase

of its contents which he handed to me one by one during the interview. Another child suddenly spotted the digital recorder and picked it up, causing her mother to have to wrestle it from her grip. These situations were very different from the quiet calm of the interviews at the women’s centre but I had a sense that this was an integral part of ethnographic study in which the women were interviewed in their residential settings with the noise of daily life continuing around us. Ethically, I was also aware that these young children, by being present during interview, were potentially exposed to hearing accounts of distressing incidents, however, excluding children from the room was not an option and would have prevented women from sharing their stories, thus losing the opportunity to gain valuable interview materials. That the women in the refuges were so keen to tell their stories reminded me of what the woman in the group sessions had said about not wanting to re-live her experiences at that stage. It seemed that the women in the refuges had an urgency to talk about their ongoing experiences in order to make sense of them as part of the transitional process from victim to survivor. Thus, the women moved from their normative victimised silence to a place of value, even within a marginalised space, reflecting Butler’s claim that there can be empowerment in marginalised positions (2002).

A second interview that was excluded from extensive thematic analysis was that of Louise, a resident in refuge A. Louise had lived in Salford for two years after moving from Ghana with her husband. Her husband was physically violent and emotionally abusive towards her. She was only permitted to leave the house to do household shopping and was prevented from having any friends. Louise was also forbidden from speaking to her family, including her ten-year-old son from a previous relationship who lived in Ghana. Louise contacted Women’s Aid to gain accommodation where she had been for several weeks. She praised the refuge staff and appreciated the friendship of the women, however she found refuge life “hard to bear”

particularly seeing other residents with their children. Louise’s priorities were to find housing and employment in Salford so that her son could join her from Ghana. Louise told her story

briefly and gave very short answers to follow-up questions. She appeared willing to talk but struggled to verbalise her experiences and emotions. This indicated the contradiction between desperately wanting to talk about a painful experience yet being unable to do so. Louise’s brief interview was as relevant and poignant in what she was unable to say as what she did verbalise, raising the important question ‘how does one speak of the unspeakable?’ Louise ended the interview by saying “you have to talk about it so that you can be free.” It occurred to me that she was still in the process of freeing herself from her abusive experiences but talking to a researcher, even in a limited capacity, was her first tentative step in doing so. Feminist research seeks to challenge exclusionary practices of discourse that dictate what constitutes acceptable speech (Mills, 1997). Thus, Louise was given the opportunity to process her experience at a level with which she felt comfortable through the ethnographic approach this study utilised. I considered the possibility that, as a black woman displaced from her country of origin and separated from family, Louise found it difficult to engage with me, a white researcher from Salford. This highlights the impact of intersectional aspects of women’s experiences, yet Louise attempted to overcome these potential barriers by volunteering to speak to me.

Field materials gained from observations undertaken in the field are an integral part of the study. Descriptions of the group and of refuge life provide a contextual framework against which to juxtapose and expand upon thematic findings. The themes are not, therefore, presented as isolated experiences or statements but, in true ethnographic form, are contextualised within the fields from which they were collected. A thematic approach complements ethnographic descriptions of observational materials by positioning thematic interpretations within their cultural context. Rich descriptions of observations now act as social and cultural backdrop for the experiential element of participants’ narratives in the following thematic presentation.