Emerging scholars of Childhood Studies

Abstract

All of you are actively participating in the ongoing discussions that are taking place in the interdisciplinary field of childhood studies through your own scholarly work and efforts to shape this dynamic field. What has brought you to this field and what do you find particularly interesting and fascinating in the work produced today in childhood studies? Feel free to refer to your own work and interests when discussing this. Afua My interest in childhood studies was rather accidental I would say. After completing my BA degree in History and Sociology I decided to embark on a Masters in Development Studies as I felt that was the career path I wanted to follow. This was a decision I made after spending 10 weeks in Ghana the previous summer undertaking fieldwork for my undergraduate dissertation. At this point I was not aware of any debates in childhood studies and I was not especially driven to study development due to any special interest in children's wellbeing or welfare in the South. However, early on during my Masters degree one of my modules focused on complex emergencies and the issue of children involved in armed conflicts was raised. For some reason, this topic struck a chord within me and I became somewhat fixated on this issue. What seemed to interest me in particular was how childhood was understood in societies where children were involved in armed conflict. I completed my MSc dissertation on the issue of child soldiers focusing on Sierra Leone and Liberia (Twum-Danso, 2000). However, the question of how childhood is constructed and understood in different societies remained on my mind and eventually I embarked on a PhD project which sought to explore constructions of childhood in Ghana and the implications for the Convention on the Rights of the Child (Twum-Danso, 2008). It was when I started my PhD that I began to engage with the childhood studies literature (theoretical and methodological). It was at this point that I encountered the works of key thinkers of the time in childhood studies:

Becoming‘brilliant’: Generationing education and development in rural Sierra Leone

“…There has been increasing focus on the relational aspects of children’s lives and how these vary across social and cultural context (Hanson et al, 2018; Spyrou et al, 2018). In addition, queries have been raised about the ‘globalizing’ of childhood(s) within a wider neo-liberal frame and its alignment with normative /hegemonic conceptions of a ‘good’ childhood (Kjorholt, 2013).…”

Material as actor in the enactment of social norms: Engaging with a sociomaterial perspective in childhood studies to avoid the ‘traps of closure’

“…In line with potential multiplicity, Leonard (2020) claims that ANT will ‘enable space to be opened up for new structures to emerge that may coexist, incorporate, or transform existing structures producing constantly changing versions of childhood and adulthood’(p. 826). Scholars thus seem to agree that ANT and STS can be used to open the field of childhood studies and avoid the aforementioned ‘traps of closure’ (Spyrou, 2018b).…”

“…Within childhood studies there has been a call for more interdisciplinary and cross‐border collaborations to deal with the complexity and multiplicity of childhood, as well as engage with wider social theory (Alanen et al, 2018; Spyrou et al, 2018). Spyrou urges a continuous introspection of ideas, frameworks and principles in an ongoing dialogue in the field of childhood studies in order to ‘de‐reify “the child” and avoid the traps of closure’ (Spyrou, 2018, p. 420).…”

Making Lithuanian Families Across Borders

“…It has also reasserted the agency of all family members, grandparents, siblings and children rather than over-focusing on parents. This recognition of the role of generations in families has been taken up by other researchers who stress this approach focuses not only on age but acknowledges the intersectionality of the concept with class, gender and ethnicity (Spyrou et al, 2018) and, as such, would appear to mesh into a Family Configuration approach. Yet here, Widmer and Jallinoja's (2008) focus on structure may be too confining for some researchers; it may be that the new concept of generagency coined by Leonard (2019) would be usefully transferred into family research.…”