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In this chapter, I offer some insights into what I learned over the course of my inquiry into the living and learning that took place on the edges of community. I highlight the inconclusive nature of narrative inquiry as well as demonstrate my recognition that in any narrative inquiry we exit as we entered, in medias res, in the middle of things. Even though the inquiry ends, we continue to compose stories and to share those stories. Our understanding is only ever partial in the same way the stories we compose are incomplete, unfinished. In seeking a conclusion that is not a conclusion, then, I contend that experiences are complex and the stories we compose about those experiences are also complex. The insights and wonderings that emerged from the analysis of my own experiences as well as the experiences of my participants shaped themselves into the overlapping areas of identity-making, curriculum making, and community. In particular, I explored the stories people composed from the edges of community; those spaces conventionally described by the dominant narrative as marginalized. The participants discussed in this chapter demonstrated how profoundly they were each impacted by their positioning as marginalized. At the same time, their stories had a strong thread of self-definition that was insubordinate to that positioning. In varied ways, the participants refused to be defined by others or as other. Their experiences suggested that those spaces conventionally thought of as peripheral, the edges, were actually the defining features of communities.

Sustainable development may best be achieved by enhancing the commitment of local communities. Stewart and Hams (1991) argue that the requirements of sustainable development cannot merely be imposed but that active participation by local communities is needed. However, the terms ‘community’, ‘host community’ and ‘participation’ can be interpreted in a myriad of ways. Before entering a full discussion of host community participation in tourism planning, it is first necessary to explore the various potential interpretations of these terms and to define their meaning and function. This chapter therefore clarifies some of the issues surrounding the terms community, host, host community and participation. The major typologies and available models in relation to host communities’ participation in sustainable planning for tourism are also reviewed.

The children returned and Ms. Lee had them go to their desks. There was so much excitement in the air … . Ms. Lee has rearranged the desks again and I like how there are such frequent shifts in seating. Ms. Lee spoke of their photographs and their collages. She then said I would give the guiding question for their work on the citizenship education project today in their small sustained response groups. I fumbled badly and said something about who they are and how they belong. Ms. Lee wrote it on the board. As Ms. Lee continued to speak, I went and changed the words to “Who I am and how I belong.” Ms. Lee spoke to the children of how they were going to start putting their photos on their poster boards and to think about how their photographs were representations of who they were and where they belonged. No glue or scissors at this point. She also showed them the paper where she wanted them to write about their photographs.The children got their individual pieces of bristol board for their collages and Ms. Lee said they might want to choose a spot on the floor as they did this work. They were intent and focused on their own photographs but were also sharing with their neighbours. At one point, I commented to Ms. Lee, Simmee, and Jennifer about how impressed I was with their intentness. I spent some time with Logan who had some magnificent photographs … he has an eye for the aesthetic. I pointed out to him how much I liked the photographs. I also spent some time with Taylor who had three photographs of clothes: one Chinese outfit, one Korean outfit, and a long white dress that she said she did not know what it was. I asked if it was a christening dress and she said she thought so, that her mom had taken the photograph. She also had a close up of a Canadian flag. I spent some time with Sophie who had rejected some of her photographs as not interesting. When I pointed out what I saw as interesting things in her photographs, she started to see them more positively. I asked a few children what they planned to put in the centre of their collages. I realized, even as I asked that question, that I was privileging the centre photograph. Liam had his dad's photo clearly in the centre. He was busily writing words. He said he wasn't sure what to write about his dad but then wrote something about family being important. (Field notes, April 2, 2007)

This chapter explores the state's response to the waste crisis (see also McDonagh, Varley, & Shortall, 2009). The conceptual basis for key turning points in the state's waste management policy is located within the parameters of an EM approach. An outline of eco-modern and sustainable thinking is provided in the chapter, as the state's policy shift on waste, from a reliance on landfill to a strategy informed by the EU's waste hierarchy would provide many of the political opportunities for GSE, and their political allies, to exploit.

Environmental campaigns in Ireland can be divided into pre- and post-affluence phases of multinational-led economic development in Ireland between 1958 and 2002. I construct an ‘issue history’ (Szasz, 1994) that locates the GSE case within the context of a series of community challenges to toxic industries during that period. These cases are relevant to an understanding of environmental movement activity in the decades before GSE's own campaign, before the onset of economic growth, or in the post-boom years when issues such as landfilling and incineration were the subjects of disputes across Ireland. I examine some earlier cases that have parallels with GSE's case in terms of their primary focus on toxicity and health risks, but I also look at the emergence of landfill and municipal incineration disputes since the mid-1990s that can be traced to the explosion of waste as a by-product of Irish society's fixation with consumerism.

Sexual crime in the Irish Free State was more than an issue of law, it carried ideological importance in a nation that legitimised itself as a beacon of Celtic Catholicism whilst struggling to maintain credibility in a contested post-colonial landscape. The nation’s police force, An Garda Síochána, had a central role in preserving the nation’s reputation for piety. This chapter explores the views of two of An Garda Síochána’s most senior officers regarding female sexuality and sexual crime; features that were to influence the level of protection and justice Ireland’s women and children were afforded under law.

The word ‘myth’ is usually misused by social scientists who think of it as being equivalent to an untruth. However, more accurately, a myth is a basic organising story, often recounting the origins and development of a people; as such it offers meaning, a way of understanding the path their development took. In this sense, the Celtic Tiger is a myth, as it was a story told about the final arrival of the Irish people at their long elusive goal of development and plenty. All that went before was the pre-history of many failures until the conditions became right for the final breakthrough. One of the functions of myth is that it legitimises a particular hierarchical ordering of social, political and economic power; to the extent that it does this through investing the order of society with a sacred significance, it reinforces a power hierarchy and makes it much more difficult to critique and undermine. In these ways, the account of Ireland's success that we call the Celtic Tiger was a myth, and it proved a very successful one since it won general acquiescence throughout society, including from academics and opinion formers.