Allison James
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New mantra for policy & practice since UNCRC
1989
Listening to children about matters that concerns
them
Children's wishes and feelings to be sought out
“Children’s voices” seen as symbol of democratic
society
Yet…
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articulate few often stand for the many
exploitation of poor and oppressed – use of children
as witnesses of hunger
seen as authentic, unmediated voices
symbolic of innocence of children
Inclusion of children's views still often tokenistic
voices still often ignored & dismissed in practice
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‘new paradigm’ 1970s onwards
Hardman (1973); James and Prout (1990)
Children as social actors
Children as informants about own lives
Children’s standpoint & perspective
◦ an account of society from the point where children stand –
that is, from a children’s standpoint – is in principle just as
conceivable as any of the theoretical accounts of more
conventional ‘adult sociologies’ (Alanen 1992:109).
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1990s onwards
New methods for research and accessing children’s views
◦ children’s voices/ perspectives appear in research
accounts, speaking about the things that concern them as
children.
◦ growth of participatory research methods to access
children’s views
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Why is it that given the political rhetoric
surrounding the commitment to hearing “children’s
voices” and, apparently, now having the theoretical
and methodological means to access them, little of
what children say seems to get heard outside of the
academy (Roberts 2000) ?
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Epistemological break with ideas of children's
incompetence to speak
BUT
◦ No longer sufficient simply to present children’s voices as
apt illustrations
◦ Childhood studies has now to engage more directly with
core issues of social theory & policy & practice
◦ must clearly identify unique contribution to understanding
social world that children’s perspectives offer – i.e. why
children's voices matter
◦ need to recognise potential of political shift - parallel shifts
in feminism
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(1) Authenticity & representation
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Who is representing children?
How are children's voices being represented?
For what purposes?
What role(s) do children's voices carry in research?
( 2) Issues of diversity
◦ “children’s voices” and “voices of children” gloss differences
between children
◦ UNCRC – best interests of “the child” (Article 12)
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(3) Issues of participation
◦ Research roles – research “on” or “with” children?
 How far are / can children be included in research?
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(4) Issues of interpretation
 Can adult researchers see the world from “ the native’s [children's}
point of view” (Geertz 1983) ?
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(5) Children as researchers?
 Does using children as researchers necessarily lead to:
 greater authenticity?
 Does it overcome power differences in the research relationship?
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Need to interrogate authenticity and representation
◦ “the voice of the child” is not unimpeachable
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Children’s voices in accounts NOT authentic
◦ Voices chosen , selected by author
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Need to avoid “ethnographic ventriloquism” (Geertz
1983)i.e. claiming to speak for children
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‘ the ethnographer …in the end assumes an executive ,
editorial position’ (Clifford 1988:51).
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Need to recognise that “the voice of the child” is not
universal
◦ there is no such thing as ‘the child’
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need to avoid text positivism i.e. assuming that
“ what children say” applies to all children
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“Children’s voices” are always glossed by the author
◦ ‘quotations are always staged by the quoter and tend to
serve merely as examples of confirming testimonies’ (Clifford
1988:50)
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Need to challenge routine “quoting” voices in text
◦ adding decoration in claim to authenticity
◦ tokenistic practices
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Participatory research methods do allow children’s
voices to be heard
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Fun for children to do
allows abstract ideas to become more concrete
Mediates research relationship
Draws on children's own skills
BUT
◦ Can become end in their own sake!
◦ Proliferation of methods often just a proliferation – not
triangulation
◦ Children can become over researched and over whelmed
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Aim to make children’s voices more authentic &
overcome other problems
BUT
◦ ‘the reasons why a child or a young person should choose to participate in research are
clearer in some studies than others…we cannot take it for granted that participation in
research and the development of increasingly sophisticated research methods to facilitate
children’s participation is necessarily always in their interests’ ( Roberts 2000:238).
◦ Can be potentially as exploitative as other forms of research
◦ Can lead to a tension between research and advocacy roles
◦ Can limit aims of research and research questions to “children's
issues”, rather than asking children about other m,ore global
concerns
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Research has revealed children's engagement with adult world &
need to listen to children
◦ (e.g. children’s views of parental divorce Smart, Neale and Wade 2001)
◦ (e.g. implementation of Childrend ACT 1989 -children's wishes and
feelings & adults’ idea of “best interests” (James, James and McNamee
2004)
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Child-centred research has assisted with promotion of children's
rights & their local implementation
◦ ( e.g. children as health educations Onyango-Ouma 2001)
◦ Children’s perspectives on child labour (Boyden, Ling and Myers 1998)
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Recognition of social construction of childhood has enabled
diversity to be explored
◦ (e.g. culturally appropriate interventions Woodhead 1996)
◦ ( e.g. children's views on gender and race in the classroom (Connolly
1998; 2004)
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Childhood studies achieved a great deal
Poised for development in future
Voices important but also need to explore structural
issues
Cultural politics of children's voices can explore
relationship between:
◦ Childhood as a social space
◦ Childhood as a generational category
◦ Child as individual