ABSTRACT
This chapter draws from a study which explores the conceptualisations of care in theory and practice, examining (in Pierre Bourdieu’s terms) its ‘doxic’ qualities: that is, how it often seems ‘natural’, ‘self-evident’, or ‘understood without question’. Presenting findings from research with young people and practitioners involved in a programme of activities for young people, Not in Education, Employment and Training provision (‘NEET’), in northern England, the chapter demonstrates how care is often a contested concept for both the carer and the ‘caree’. Care is also undermined by a neoliberal context imbued with a culture of performativity, austerity cuts, and a less tolerant milieu, all of which constrain relational encounters of care. The chapter argues for a lens of ‘contextualised care’, which ensures that staff and young people operate within an arena of negotiated relational care.
