Construction of normality in the gecekondu settlement: Experience of place, social pressure, and tactics

Abstract

This article aims to interrogate the construction of normality with a view to a squatter metropolitan setting in İzmir, Turkey. In doing so, I focus on the everyday experiences of the inhabitants in Limontepe and frame them in the context of place-making. I read the concept of ‘normal’ through Bourdieu’s notion of habitus and refer to women’s micro-practices in drawing its contours. Women, living within the boundaries of normality use tactics to cope with the existing normal and related interventions to their bodies, movements, and thoughts. Ethnographic research is the key to understanding inhabitants’ gendered experiences with space.