Premium
What’s Recreational about ‘Recreational Rioting’? Children on the Streets in Belfast
Author(s) -
Leonard Madeleine
Publication year - 2010
Publication title -
children and society
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.538
H-Index - 58
eISSN - 1099-0860
pISSN - 0951-0605
DOI - 10.1111/j.1099-0860.2008.00190.x
Subject(s) - recreation , focus group , criminology , politics , protestantism , sociology , psychology , political science , law , anthropology
The purpose of this paper was to explore teenagers’ perception of the concept of ‘recreational rioting’. It draws on focus group discussions with 80 Catholic and Protestant teenagers who live in one of the most contested interface areas in Northern Ireland, many of whom have experience of rioting. The majority of children who took part in the research were highly critical of the connotations associated with ‘recreational rioting’ and their experiences of rioting calls into question the ‘recreational’ aspects of the practice. While many children were motivated to become involved in rioting because of ‘something to do’, their participation was imbued with political undertones.