ABSTRACT
The most familiar territory on which sibling relationships are thought about is within the family and in the home. But for the sisters and brothers in the studies presented here, it was striking how much of the to and fro of their interactions went on beyond the living room and the bedroom, to include the street, the stairways and walkways of flats, the homes of neighbours, friends and wider family, parks and playgrounds, places of worship, schools, buses and trains, sport centres, shopping centres and out-of-school classes. Most of these locations outside of the home were fairly immediate and local, and were the mundane, everyday sites of journeys, leisure and learning. Importantly, these are the physical spaces in which communities exist. This chapter follows siblings out of the confines of the home to consider some of the varied ways in which they construct and conduct their relationships in the places, spaces and communities of the ‘outside’ world. We look at the ways in which these sites form part of the complex arena in which children’s and young people’s identities are shaped, and the particular roles that siblings play in the negotiation and mapping of one another’s identities in those geographical, social and cultural landscapes.
