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The Unacceptable Flaneur

The Shopping Mall as a Teenage Hangout

HUGH MATTHEWS

University College Northampton hugh.matthews{at}northampton.ac.uk

MARK TAYLOR

University College Northampton

BARRY PERCY-SMITH

University College Northampton

MELANIE LIMB

University College Northampton

This article considers the importance of the shopping mall to a group of young people living in the East Midlands of the UK. It shows that for many young people the mall provides a convenient place for hanging out. Yet their occupancy of this setting is not unproblematic. Many adults, for example, perceive the public and visible presence of young people as uncomfortable and inappropriate. Despite constant attempts to move them on, however, young people stubbornly remain within the mall asserting a right of presence. In order to (re)interpret these behaviours (both that of teenager and adult), the study draws upon the new literature of the cultural politics of difference and identity. It suggests that through their various attempts to assert a right of presence, young people assume the mantle of the hybrid. Here, young people are no longer child, nor quite adult. By locating themselves in settings that transgress and so question the spatial hegemony of adulthood, young people journey into the interstitial territory of `thirdspace'. From this perspective the mall assumes a cultural importance over and above its functional form.

Key Words: cultural politics of place • hanging out • shopping mall • teenagers • thirdspace

Childhood, Vol. 7, No. 3, 279-294 (2000)
DOI: 10.1177/0907568200007003003
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