**5. Relational exclusion**

Ethnic segregation in housing areas and differentiated access to higher education and wellpaid, high-status jobs in the labour market are exclusionary mechanisms at the macro level. But there are also many forms of exclusion in face-to-face social interaction, including more indirect forms of exclusion, such as subtle ways of watching, talking or in other ways relating or not relating to others. According to Taylor (1994: 25), our identity is partly shaped by recognition or its absence, and so a person can suffer if others mirror a confining or demeaning picture. The lack of recognition or being associated with categories that one does not one identify with can inflict harm and be experienced as a form of oppression, as it imprisons the individual in a false, distorted and reduced form of being.

Some young people adopt such depreciatory images of themselves, so that even if some of the obstacles to their advancement fall away, they may be incapable of taking advantage of their own opportunities (Taylor, 1994). Such processes are sometimes seen among young immigrants, that they adopt the stigma to which their ethnicity is viewed by the majority (Eidheim, 1987; Lewin, 1948).

Also more defined social rituals can be perceived as excluding, as when the drinking pattern of young non-immigrants tend to exclude young Muslims who follow the prescription of their religion to avoid alcohol. Some young immigrants are vulnerable to the signals from non-immigrant persons, and misinterpretations occur. As for those persons who tend to ignore the young immigrants this does not need to be an action (or non-action) meant to hurt. Maybe the person not acknowledging the other is shy; or maybe he is just occupied by his own inner thoughts. There might also be norms of ceremonial distance, as Goffman (1967: 63) calls it, that the young immigrant is not aware of. Ceremonial distance is related to class background in the sense that 'the higher the class, the more extensive and elaborated are the taboos against contact'. Goffman describes several examples of non-person treatment, where people of higher status act as if the other was not there at all (*ibid*.: 67). Goffman analyzes the presence of avoidance rituals and presentational rituals in relation to differences of status and class background, but only indirectly touches the issues of ethnicity and racism related to such phenomena. Not to recognize the other through presentational rituals might be an expression of racism, albeit not necessarily on a very conscious level. There might be an attitude that the other is not important, she is not an equal. This might also be linked to a certain form of embarrassment. She is a foreigner, and therefore the person does not know how to approach her. In order not to do anything wrong, he chooses not to recognize the other at all, which in effect might be more hurtful for the other than if he had chosen the wrong greeting ritual.

More outright exclusionary practices in face-to-face relations are various instances of racism. Many authors argue that when analyzing phenomena, such as exclusion, racism and humiliation, one must take into account how it is felt more than the intentions of those imposing it (Fangen, 2006b; Fangen, 2008). Some young people tend to downplay the importance of experiences of exclusion or racism or humiliation or even express understanding of them, while others tend to be oversensitive to such experiences and interpret all barriers as a result of racism or as humiliation (Prieur, 2004). This can be analyzed in relation to their situation in general, their social network, their class position, and so on (Fangen, 2008).
