“It's On All the Time in Our House:” Police Scanners and Everyday Rural Life*

Abstract

Police radio scanners are a common feature of homes in rural Upstate New York, but little attention has been given to how their use affects local communities. Drawing on in‐depth interviews with residents of a small town in the Adirondack Park, I examine how the scanner becomes a key factor in structuring experiences of daily life. A common feature of rural communities, the scanner positions policing at the center of everyday life, shapes perceptions of criminality and policing for those listening, and may have significant consequences for vulnerable residents. The scanner provides residents with the opportunity to develop informal networks of care, yet simultaneously limits the ability of some residents to access community and emergency services. I argue that the scanner comes to mediate contradictory structures for the town and blends police power and presence with the experience of everyday rural social life as part of broader processes that delineate, justify, and legitimize boundaries of social difference. Bridging scholarship on rural communities and police technology, this project advances a framework to understand how the scanner shapes and structures access to symbolic capital vis‐a‐vis the state and logics of policing in the name of community safety.