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Questo studio si occupa di investigare il percorso abitativo degli immigrati, dedicando un’attenzione particolare alla varietà degli elementi che contribuiscono al suo evolversi e alla loro connessione con fenomeni macro, come il mercato abitativo o le politiche abitative. Il fieldwork, un quartiere nel Sud della città di Milano, è stato scelto per due ragioni: da una parte, esso è infatti caratterizzato da una considerevole presenza di popolazione immigrata, dall’altra, tale quartiere, è stato soggetto, nel corso degli ultimi anni a una serie di interventi di recupero urbano e sociale promossi da attori privati e pubblici. Tramite l’utilizzo di diversi strumenti metodologici, le storie di vita, le interviste a testimoni chiave, l’osservazione etnografica e la creazione di mappe, la ricerca mira a cogliere la complessità che caratterizza la dimensione abitativa nell’esperienza migratoria. Esperienze individuali, fenomeni spaziali e politiche sono tutti elementi oggetto di osservazione. L’utilizzo delle mappe, inoltre, costituisce un’innovazione e un esperimento in ambito metodologico. Il complesso della ricerca è volto a suggerire un nuovo approccio all’analisi dei percorsi abitativi, sia da un punto di vista teorico che metodologico. L’analisi finale è dedicata a una riflessione sull’efficacia e i limiti delle politiche per la casa e per l’immigrazione. / This work aims to investigate the housing pathway of migrants, paying attention to the variety of different features from which they are shaped over time and their interaction with structural dimensions, as housing market and policies. Through the use of different methodological instruments, this research tries to gather the complexity concerning the dimension of home in migrants’ experience. The fieldwork, a neighborhood in Southern Milan, has been chosen for two main reasons: in the one hand it is characterized by a considerable presence of migrants at different stages of their migration experience, on the other hand it has been interested by urban renovation programs and social interventions promoted by private and public actors. Individual experiences are thus investigated, alongside with spatial phenomena, policies and interventions. Achieving these different fields of interest implied the utilization of life story interviews, ethnographic observation, key informants interviews and participatory maps. This last technique constitutes a methodological innovation. The purpose is to suggest a new approach in analyzing housing pathway, both from a theoretical and methodological perspective. In addition the research aims to reflect on the efficacy and limits of housing and immigration policies drawing on evidence based data.

Aim: The aim of this study was to identify and interpret former criminal delinquents experiences of what internal, social and structual factors are contingent on the process of change in offending. Method: A qualitative method was used with a hermeneutic approach. A qualitative inquiry was conducted through three semi-structured life story interviews with former criminal delinquents working on an organization that specifically strives to help delinquents to desist from crime.  The mode of analysis utilized in this study was the concept of turning points and a life course perspective which are useful tools in understanding the crucial parts of the processes and factors in the desistance process. Results: The results identified twelve sub-interpretations which were distilled into three over-arching interpretations which lead to the following singular conceptual interpretation: Creating preconditions to promote reintegration and readaptation to society is viewed as important to successfully desist from crime, which, in turn, depends on three sets of factors: cognitive transformation, individual’s social environment and structural/external factors which are interdependent on each other. Future research areas are suggested.

In the German Democratic Republic (GDR) the overthrow of the socialist regime did not only bring about both an economic and political shift, it resulted also in the inclusion of the GDR into the Federal Republic of Germany. The fall of the Wall brought with it transformations in everyday life as well as changes in social identities. This study examines how people who grew up in the GDR define the East and the West in unified Germany, as well as identifying which concepts play a role in the self-interpretations given by former GDR citizens. Through applying discourse theory, I investigate how identities are partially fixed and change over time, relating this always to historically situated discourses. In the analysis, East and West are considered as floating signifiers, which, through articulations made with other categories such as class, nation, place and gender, come to be filled with meaning. The study is based on twenty-five life story interviews conducted in Eastern Germany. The group of interviewees consisted of fifteen women and ten men born in the GDR between the years of 1970 and 1979, all of whom had different levels of education. The demise of the socialist state and the transition to a capitalist society is central in the interviewees’ life stories. Their narratives about the past are formed in a discursive order other than the one in which the events themselves took place. Conversely, the past is used as a foil against which the present is compared. With the dislocation, the interviewees have developed a reflexive stance to both themselves and the world. The study reveals both how East and West are still used to make the world intelligible in a number of fields and, at the same time, how these same concepts are transcended. It shows in what ways the interviewees employ different strategies to adapt to the new circumstances and to handle a potentially marked position in unified Germany.