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This thesis is an ethnography of how individuals experience urban change and difference on a south London street. My research focuses on the contemporary increase in cultural and ethnic diversity in London, and I explore what this means for social life and shared space on the Walworth Road. The purpose is to observe and interpret the forms of contact and distance people develop in living with difference in their everyday lives. I use a mixture of official, archival and ethnographic data to contrast how individuals transgress or re-inscribe social and spatial boundaries, and how systems of power authorise boundaries between people and places. I also combine ethnographic and visual methods to analyse and illustrate the layers of place, time and experience that are invoked by narratives of change on the Walworth Road. Although my thesis connects the global and local impacts of change, I select the small independent shops along the Walworth Road as the base of my exploration. Within a selection of shop interiors, I explore forms of social contact that are locally constituted through regular, face-to-face interaction, and through shared spaces and practices that engage people across diverse spectrums. I analyse the relationships between proprietors and customers: between workspaces and work skills and social spaces and social skills. Through this empirical process, I emphasise the social and political significance of ordinary spaces and informal memberships that emerge out of everyday contact in neither overtly public, nor overtly private space. This thesis has been edited into a book form to be released by Routledge in May 2012, the title of which is ‘City, Street and Citizen: The measure of the ordinary’.

Background: The mixed race child population is growing proportionately faster than any other group. Whilst there is a body of research in this country, albeit small, that looks at the experiences of mixed race children, none of this research examines specifically the risks for mental health and the possibilities for developing resilience which may be related to growing up as a mixed race child. Methods: Twenty-one adults, recruited through the internet, were asked to reflect on their childhood experiences in relation to being mixed race. They were offered a choice of response methods. The majority chose to provide a written account. A thematic analysis was carried out, within a phenomenological framework. A further analysis was undertaken to assess whether risks to mental health or opportunities to develop resilience could be identified in the findings from the phenomenological analysis using known risk and resilience factors relating to the mental health of children and young people. Results: The data show that there are some additional risks to the mental health of mixed race young people. As well as difficulties experienced in establishing personal identity, they show that there are specific difficulties in secondary school and that young people of mixed race experience racism and prejudice from both black and white peers. The data indicate a capacity for building resilience, necessitated by their mixedness, linked to supportive families. Conclusions: The overarching findings from this study mirror many of those from other mixed race studies. However this study shows how mixed race young people may experience some additional risks to mental health which need to be understood and considered by professionals in health, social care, education and justice systems.

The area of sexuality for people with learning disability is a much neglected area of research. It is possible that this may be influenced by the attitudes that professionals have towards the sexuality of the people they work with. In order to discuss this issue the literature review in chapter one provides an overview of the studies carried out over the past twenty years concerning staff attitudes towards the sexuality of people with learning disabilities. This discussion will be set within the context of the principles outlined in the Government White Paper. Current research examining the behaviour of men who have a learning disability and sexually offend has been completed without the use of control groups, thus making it difficult to assess whether there are any differences between men who sexually offend and those who do not. Although the current literature identifies some of the characteristics that may contribute towards the risk of offending, it does not present any information regarding models of offending for people who have a learning disability. The research in Chapter two explores the attitudes of men, both offenders and non-offenders with learning disabilities, towards sex and sexuality their experiences. Semi-structured interviews were carried out and analysed using grounded theory methodology and theoretical models developed. Methodological limitations, clinical implications and future research were also considered. Chapter three demonstrates some of the researcher's reflections on research with sex offenders. These include the methodological choice of grounded theory and its' appropriateness when used with people who have a learning disability, the impact of the researcher's gender on the interview process and some of the issues that being pregnant during the interviews posed. Finally, supervision and its' significance in terms of the subjectivity and bias of data interpretation is discussed.

My understanding of 'race' and racism in Britain is that it is discussed variously. Sometimes it steals the headlines as when Stephen Lawrence was murdered (Macpherson 1999). Yet at other times there is a preference not to mention the subject at all. Public discourse on 'race' and racism can be reticent. Why is this? Is 'race' a difficult subject of conversation? The first chapter of this thesis examines the roots of 'race'. In Chapter Two the silence and silencing at a public level but also in everyday interaction becomes the focus. Difficult conversations are considered. The dynamic of reticence and fluency in the discourse of 'race' is explored and conceptualised with reference to the limited material in the literature on the silence and silencing of 'race' discourse. This raises the question as to who is responsible for silence; and, whose interests, if any, might be served. Chapter Three presents a real world enquiry - the Swapping Cultures Initiative in Coventry and Warwickshire; involving over 1,000 children and young people that took place mainly between 2002 and 2004. It reveals that a significant proportion of participants (3 8.1 %) experienced bullying, racism, or being picked on, based on their cultural background, and that these issues are difficult matters for conversation (38%). What is revealed is both the complexity of the participants' identities and the subtle and sophisticated ways in which their cultural backgrounds are managed through conversation. What then does silence mean when the subject is 'race'? Certainly it is nuanced and complex. Chapter Four provides a series of concluding reflections on 'race' and silence, identifying the major factors when seeking to understand and address 'race' issues in their local context. It places centrally the 'discourse of reticence' as a significant, hitherto underestimated, element when considering the prevailing and pervading presence of 'race' and racism.

The growth of mass tourism has placed great pressure on British seaside destinations, and has contributed to the social costs experienced by the resident population via symptoms of changing perceptions, attitudes and behaviour towards tourism, and the presence of higher crime rates. This thesis examines the social reality experienced by residents, and determines the impacts of tourism-related crime upon two tourist communities which are experiencing high levels of crime. The comparative study of a British seaside resort and a coastal town reveals that tourism communities are influenced by individual resident opinions. Simultaneously these communities influence resident perception and behaviour towards tourism-related crime, and it is through this exchange process, that evidence of destination specific criteria has emerged. The research established that the resort community found commonality through the mutual gaze, whilst the coastal community formed closed perceptions of deviant activities through discord and the local gaze. The study concludes by arguing that a destination offering a hedonistic lifestyle will not necessarily have higher crime rates than other safer destinations. This is due to the widespread implementation of crime prevention methods in the resort, and the lack of deterrents established in the coastal town. Therefore there may be nothing criminogenic about these particular destinations. Instead, collective community perception, digressed through crime talk, has influenced community crime interpretation and individual resident evaluation of the tourism industry.

This thesis presents a model for analysing the graphic object as urban object, by considering atypical fields of discourse that contribute to the formation of the object domain. The question: what is graphic design as urban design? directs the research through an epistemological design study comprising: an interrogation of graphic design studio practice and the articulation of graphic design research questions; a review and subsequent development of research strategy, design and method towards the articulation of methodology that reflects the nature of the inquiry; a detailed analysis of five different ways to study and research graphic design as urban design, in geography, language, visual communication, art and design, and urban design. The outcome of the investigation is a model that enables future research in the urban environment to benefit from micro-meso-macrographic analysis. The model endeavours to provide a way to evaluate, design and enhance ‘public places and urban spaces’ by considering different scales of symbolic thought and deed. This has been achieved by acknowledging the relationship between the relatively miniscule detail of graphic symbolism, the point at which this becomes visible through increased scale, and the instances when it dominates the urban realm. Examples are considered that show differences between, for example, the size and spacing of letter shapes on a pedestrian sign, compared to the ‘visual’ impact of an iconic building in the cityscape. In between is a myriad of graphic elements that are experienced and designed by many different professional disciplines and occupations. These are evidenced and explained. Throughout the study an indiscriminating literature review is interwoven with the text, accompanied by tabular information, and visual data in the form of photographs and diagrams. This is mainly research-driven data utilising photographs from fieldwork in Brazil, Canada, Hong Kong, Italy, Portugal, South Korea, United Kingdom, and United States of America. The methodology integrates a transdisciplinary adaptive theory approach derived from sociological research, with graphic method (utilising a wider scope of visual data usually associated with graph theory). The following images provide sixteen examples of artefacts representing the graphic object as urban object phenomenon.

The relationships between the land management system and the town planning system play a crucial role in the process of land development, especially as Henan province is experiencing accelerated industrialization. In recent years, China has adjusted its land management system. The findings of the research show that the current land management system and town planning system of China are not compatible with each other when faced with the rapid industrialization of the core towns in Henan province. Furthermore, the incompatibilities between China’s current land management system and town planning system have impeded the growth of the industrial scale and raised the costs of industrialization. There are two main reasons which cause the incompatibilities between these two systems, namely the contrasting characteristics between the town planning system and land management system and the different objectives between the local governments and the central government of China. The incompatibilities between China’s town planning system and land management system are rooted in and shaped by the central-local relations.

Representation of ethnic communities is a matter of importance for Canada. Members of various ethnic communities tend to be habitual non-voters, not engaged into political life. This thesis examines how five Liberal Members of Parliament from the city of Winnipeg Interviews were used to get a better understanding of practices, used by five Liberal Members of Parliament from the city of Winnipeg during and after their campaigns in 2015. This allowed for a better understanding of how do MPs reach out to their ethnic community constituents, learn about their needs. It was found that differences in the way MPs reach out to ethnic communities were mainly attributing to differences in riding ecology, personal view and preferences, and communities MPs work with. / February 2017