‘You don’t have to be watched to make your toast’: Surveillance and Food Practices within Residential Care

Abstract

This paper explores forms of surveillance within residential care homes for young people. It is argued that surveillance is a crucial aspect of care and this can be experienced as both negative and positive by children and staff. In particular the research was concerned with how forms of control and monitoring are conducted in relation to food and food practices. Relations of power and resistance within the context of a care home are routinely played out and through food. The paper illustrates the ways in which children variously resist and accept regulation and control in relation to food. It also considers the manner in which staff try to implement an ambience and ethos within the care home that is not overtly institutional yet allows them to provide care for the children. In order to achieve this, often contested conceptions of ‘family’ and ‘home’ are drawn upon and operationalised through food related practices and interactions. Three residential care homes for children in central Scotland were studied using a mix of interviewing and ethnographic techniques.

Gendering Surveillance Studies: The Empirical and Normative Promise of Feminist Methodology

“…First, while it is true, in the abstract, that in many areas associated with care (health care, child care, or elder care) those who are defined as marginalized are treated differently than those who are defined as able-bodied adults (Koskela 2012: 52) it should not be automatically assumed that surveillance in the context of care is negative. As noted, with some limited exceptions, such as research done on children in residential care in Scotland by McIntosh, Punch, Dorrer and Emond (2010), there are not a lot of accounts of surveillance that deal with care. McIntosh, Punch, Dorrer and Emond attribute the dearth of Surveillance Studies research devoted to care to the penchant for research focusing on the more ominous "big brother" and "panopticon" imagery associated with surveillance and control (2010: 290).…”

Governance of the table: Regulation of food and eating practices in residential care for young people

“…Workers, according to McIntosh et al (2010), would prefer to emphasise their caring role. The softening of the edge of the message could thus perhaps be viewed as a symbolic representation of the ambivalence experienced by workers having to exercise control over young people.…”

“…The observational data showed that, apart from in Hillgrove, the young people did eat at the table with the workers. According to McIntosh et al (2010) and Punch et al (2009), young people can feel vulnerable at the table because they are monitored and assessed by not just the workers but also their fellow residents. The group dynamic in Hillgrove was described as unstable as it was a new resident group.…”

“…Food plays a significant role in daily life for the young people and the workers in residential care (Emond et al, 2013;McIntosh et al, 2010;Punch et al, 2009). Food and eating practices are central to the creation of routine, rhythm and ritual in the centres.…”

“…It 'is packed with social, cultural and symbolic meaning' (Bell & Valentine, 1997, p. 3), but its significance can often be overlooked. Food is used symbolically and practically to demonstrate both care and control in residential care (Emond et al, 2013;McIntosh et al, 2010;Punch et al, 2009). At the same time, food practices in residential care are 'mundane and everyday activities' and, as such, the 'symbolic significance can be easily overlooked' (Punch et al, 2009, p. 13).…”