Precarious leisure in a teenage wasteland? Intertwining discourses on responsibility and girls’ place-making in rural Northern Sweden

Abstract

The relationship with place has been recognized as a significant dimension of rural youth leisure, both through the discursive constructions of place, but also as affective and embodied dimensions. This study captures these processes by applying the concept of place-making as a set of recurrent discursive processes, analyzing how girls in Northern Sweden engage in place-making alongside, beyond, and in contrast to dominant discourses on leisure, rurality and wellbeing. The study draws on data from photo-elicited focus groups with girls from two sports organizations. The discursive psychology analysis resulted in three interpretative repertoires. The first repertoire describes the sharp contrast between discourses of the 'rural dull' and how stressful the participants constructed their own places of leisure. The second illustrates the gendered discourses around what is considered to be productive and respectable leisure. The third shows how the participants are made responsible for the survival of their leisure. Through place-making, the participants shape places of leisure, affecting both themselves and their rural community. They engage in, conform to, and challenge place-making within discourses of responsibility and precariousness, creating space for their own initiatives, which are simultaneously shaped by the material conditions under which these practices take place.

Adolescent outdoor life and well-being

“…"there are lots of different things I can do") compared to the suburban setting across seasons. This stands in contrast to prevailing discourses on the "dullness" of rural life for adolescents (Leyshon, 2008;Gotfredsen et al, 2022). Meanwhile, the suburban setting scored higher on perceived safety across seasons compared to the urban and rural settings.…”

“County residents take the fight”

“…Such representations highlighted a sense of community, affinity and a history of having (been forced into) taking responsibility (cf. Cras 2017; Enlund 2020; Gotfredsen et al 2021). Representations of space gained extra power from being connected with other rural places where services had been threatened -regardless of whether they had lost them forever or succeeded in taking something over -thus forming relations between different villages.…”