Bangladeshi families living in hardship: findings from research using a life-history approach

Whilst there are many commonalities in the experience of living in hardship, there are also many ways in which the experience of poverty varies. This paper draws on findings from life-history interviews about parenting and children's well-being which were undertaken with 70 low-income households including nine Bangladeshi families living in London. The paper explores the ways in which the experience of Bangladeshi families was similar to and different from the sample as a whole, discusses the intersection of culture, class, gender and ethnicity in the experience of living in poverty and how this impacted on parents' ability to access support. The findings show the many and complex ways poverty impacts on families' lives and suggest that many of the barriers for Bangladeshi families' to accessing services that have previously been identified still exist. The findings highlight the importance of social workers having the space to reflect on and develop their own practice in order to avoid oversimplistic assumptions about the experiences of Bangladeshi families and the need for home-visiting services so practitioners can develop relationships and build the confidence of the most socially excluded parents.