The Power of Place: Identity Formation in Urban and Rural Settings

Research topic/aim
This paper explores how place shapes processes of identity formation and life cultivation (Bildung) among young people (Rahbæk,2021). Drawing from two ethnographic case studies – an amateur football club in a rural context and a professional football club in an urban context – we examine how these social institutions serve as sites where youth negotiate belonging, values, and ways of being.

Theoretical framework
The theoretical framework combines perspectives on place, space, and Bildung. We view place as more than location; it is alive with meanings, practices, and representations that actively shape human experience. Building on philosophers like Norberg-Schulz, Gadamer, and Heidegger, we take Bildung to be an embodied, relational process of becoming that unfolds through encounters with the world (Rahbæk,2021). Place and Bildung intersect in their emphasis on situatedness, of formation that happens somewhere, leaving impressions through engagements with people, things, and environments (Tanggaard,2021).

Methodology/research design
The methodology employed a multiple case study approach using ethnographic methods in two contrasting contexts (Yin,2018). Data collection included observation, interviews, and "go-alongs" - guided walks with participants. Thematic analysis was conducted for each site separately then together through a bricolage of international perspectives on the research team. The urban case centred on how the football club cultivated an ethos of anti-fascism, solidarity, and resistance. The rural case focused on how the football club reinforced and modernised local values through role modelling, setting the rhythm of community life.

Expected results/findings
Preliminary findings reveal characteristics of place shaping young people's Bildung development, with key similarities and notable differences between the two contexts. In the city, values like anti-authoritarianism are embodied through civic practices and intense moments where football, politics, and locality converge. In the rural town, the club cultivates local citizenship, models blue- and white-collar professions, and aids individual mobility through an accumulation of belonging skills. Across both cases, football clubs emerge as formative spaces where young people negotiate tensions between rootedness and universality.
Relevance to Nordic educational research
This research contributes to Nordic educational scholarship by theorising place-conscious approaches to Bildung. It highlights how the pedagogy of place (Rahbæk,2021) is not merely a method but a recognition that learning and formation are always situated, unfolding through embodied participation in environments thick with social meanings.

Across both contexts, the pedagogy of place emerges as football clubs become territories of meaning where Bildung unfolds through situated engagement with the social world. This highlights the relevance of place-conscious education that recognises the formative power of lived spaces and local institutions. The paper contributes an international, empirically-grounded perspective to ongoing Nordic dialogues around place-based identity formation as a relational, context-dependent process of becoming.

Rahbek, R.K.(2021). Når dannelse finder sted. I L. Tanggaard, S. Brinkmann & T.A. Rømer (Red.), Sidste chance: Nye perspektiver på dannelse (p.39-62). Klim.
Tanggaard, L.(2021). Dannelse former os som ‘hele’ mennesker. In S. Brinkmann, T.A. Rømer, & L. Tanggaard (Eds.), Sidste chance: Nye perspektiver på dannelse (pp.19–35). Klim.
Yin, R.K.(2018). Case study research and applications: Design and methods (Sixth ed.). SAGE.