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Bowstead, Janet (2011) Space and place as constraints and resources in women’s strategies to escape domestic violence. Metronome, 1. pp. 9-17. ISSN 2046-1941
This paper reports on the early stages of a PhD research project on women’s journeys in response to domestic violence, focusing on women’s use of space as a strategy for safety. In this paper, aspects of conceptual thinking on space and place are outlined, raising questions and developing tools for the analysis of the empirical data in the later stages of the project. Using the work of various philosophers and writers from a range of disciplines to rethink issues of location and relocation, of staying put and fleeing, enables an engagement with theory within what is also an empirically grounded social sciences research project with implications for social policy and practice. This paper will particularly explore three examples of such thinking about women’s spatial strategies: Foucault’s concepts of the spatiality of surveillance are used in understanding space as a constraint and appreciating what women are overcoming when they leave abusive relationships; Deleuze and Guattari’s concepts of rhizomic networks and lines of flight are used in understanding space as a resource on the journeys themselves; and Augé’s concepts of nonplaces are used in understanding space as place, and recognising what needs to be counteracted to create new homes and a sense of belonging.
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