Child Cultures
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Glasgow
Department Name: School of Education
Abstract
CHILDCULTURES is a transdisciplinary project that investigates the shifting relationships within children's culture -literature, arts and media- as agents of change responding to the new climate on children's activism and resistance. The inquiry is framed by recent developments in the interdisciplinary field of childhood studies, the ethical and epistemological standpoints of feminist new materialism, and children's literature and media studies' critical take on adultism. This framework, along with "collaboratory" research with children, enables understanding of how shifting relationships within children's cultures may produce less adultist, anthropocentric, sexist, racist and ableist ways of knowing.
The project is organized in three interconnected strands in which the fellow collaborates with other researchers and institutions: in Strand 1, the fellow works with students of the Children's Literature, Media and Culture Erasmus Mundus Master (IMCLMC) tracing adult understandings about of how children's culture may produce less discriminatory ways of knowing; in Strand 2, the fellow invites children and other master students as co-researchers and works in partnership with an NGO in Spain in literature and arts education producing intergenerational arts-based approaches to expand ways of knowing. In Strand 3, the fellow expands on this project's theoretical and methodological advances proposing situated models involving children and child epistemologies in research. The proposed research is planned to maximize a two-way exchange of knowledge between the fellow, the host, the secondment and other researchers and institutions involved. A special focus is set on the collaboration and training-by-research opportunities related to the IMCLMC programme. The project considers different strategies for intersectoral collaborations and an innovative plan for dissemination and communication which targets different audiences, including children.
The project is organized in three interconnected strands in which the fellow collaborates with other researchers and institutions: in Strand 1, the fellow works with students of the Children's Literature, Media and Culture Erasmus Mundus Master (IMCLMC) tracing adult understandings about of how children's culture may produce less discriminatory ways of knowing; in Strand 2, the fellow invites children and other master students as co-researchers and works in partnership with an NGO in Spain in literature and arts education producing intergenerational arts-based approaches to expand ways of knowing. In Strand 3, the fellow expands on this project's theoretical and methodological advances proposing situated models involving children and child epistemologies in research. The proposed research is planned to maximize a two-way exchange of knowledge between the fellow, the host, the secondment and other researchers and institutions involved. A special focus is set on the collaboration and training-by-research opportunities related to the IMCLMC programme. The project considers different strategies for intersectoral collaborations and an innovative plan for dissemination and communication which targets different audiences, including children.
Publications
GarcÃa González M
(2024)
When a Children's Literary Jury Imagines Other Children as Potential Readers: A Case of Collaborative Research
in Childhood
| Description | The main key findings of this project can be divided in three main dimensions: The project has traced adult and expert understandings of how children's literature and culture may produce inclusion. As stated in the application, research so far has been focused on studying these dimensions separately as if dealing with distinct problems; moreover, research has been rather focused on indicating how fiction and nonfiction works for children do reproduce exclusions, rather than on how these may be contested. The project has advanced on this by reviewing how a common understanding is focused on inclusion in relation to the representation of difference, rather than in relation to the intersecting and shifting relations in a field in which various epistemologies get excluded. The project has developed certain concepts to open a discussion on how to do research and teach about children's literature and culture in relation to inclusion. Such concepts have been: children's culture, epistemic injustice, childism and future burden. A second key finding of this project has been the elaboration of a situated model for engaging with children in doing 'collaboratory research'. The fellow has partnered with children as co-researchers and has explored the borders of such endeavours proposing methodological orientations for further projects. Finally, a third key finding has been the tracing and mapping of literary prizes that include children as part of the jury. The project has identified 18 such initiatives and has categorised their similarities and differences, opening some questions about the possible best practices. |
| Exploitation Route | Research methodologies involving collaboratory research. Publishers. Children's and Young Adult award-giving organisations/institutions. Conceptual development in the field of children's literature and research. |
| Sectors | Creative Economy Education Culture Heritage Museums and Collections |
| Description | The most salient and visible impact of this project has been in the bringing together of literary prizes around the world that have or are interested in assembling child and teen juries. The different prizes responded to surveys and interviews in the frame of the project and gathered for a meeting in which participants from 16 different countries participated. In this meeting, the participants discussed what counts as participation and why should children and YA be involved in these initiatives. Different institutions have agreed to continue working together to set up a network. Other institutions, that did not have such prizes, have manifested their intention to set up one in the next months. Another, yet less visible form of impact, may be found in how the conceptual development of the project has been taken in the field of children's literature and culture research. |
| First Year Of Impact | 2023 |
| Sector | Education |
| Impact Types | Cultural |
| Title | Child and Teen Juries in Literary Prizes |
| Description | In the frame of the "CHILDCULTURES. Challenging Anthropocentrism, Adultism and Other Exclusions with Children's Literature and Culture" research project, we distributed a survey to organisers of child and teen juries for literary prizes. This survey was launched in partnership with IBBY, the International Board of Books for Young People, and with support, in particular, from the Catalonian section of IBBY. The survey was distributed on the 1st of October of 2024 and we asked the representatives of these institutions to fill it in before the 2nd of November. We then organised a meeting with all the people that had filled in the survey and on requirement of some of them, reopened the form so that we could collected information from some institutions that have not filled it in. The repository of the University of Glasgow shares now the datasets from the survey: an Excel spreadsheet that contains all the answers (and some explicative notes when needed) and a PDF with the questions on the form the representatives answered to. We hope this information is useful for the participants in the study, as well as to other researchers working on literary prizes. |
| Type Of Material | Database/Collection of data |
| Year Produced | 2024 |
| Provided To Others? | Yes |
| Impact | This is the first dataset bringing together information from the literary prizes around the world that have children and young people as juries. |
| URL | https://researchdata.gla.ac.uk/1591/ |
| Description | IBBY - International Board of Books for Young People- Partnership on Children's Participation in Literary Prizes |
| Organisation | International Board on Books for Young People |
| Country | Switzerland |
| Sector | Charity/Non Profit |
| PI Contribution | IBBY is an international organisation devoted to reading promotion. The IBBY executive directive -Carolina Ballester- was contacted after initiating a collaboration with the Catalonian division of IBBY and its two children's literature prizes awarded by children: Atrapallibres and Protagonista Jove. We started working together in January 2023 working on the production of a survey about these prizes that have launched from the research project and IBBY distributed this survey with the different sections. A joint meeting of the different iniatiatives was held in January 2024. A publication with the main results was disseminated and the data was made available on the Glasgow repository. |
| Collaborator Contribution | They have helped to design the survey, have helped to distribute it and to prepare a joint publication. |
| Impact | - A publication - A dataset - A network |
| Start Year | 2023 |
| Description | MACBA - Thinking and Doing with Picturebooks against Exclusion |
| Organisation | Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art |
| Country | Spain |
| Sector | Private |
| PI Contribution | I have collaborated with the department of Documentation and with the division of Education of the Museum of Contemporary Arts in Barcelona (MACBA) on collection acquisition of picturebooks, training in literary mediation for museum staff, and advice on the design of mediation programmes for families. |
| Collaborator Contribution | I have done two training sessions for the museum staff and have recorded a podcast for their webradio. The collaboration is ongoing and includes advisory for acquisitions of picture books, display in an exhibition "Canción para muchos movimientos" as well as the creation of a reading mediation programme. Two outreach publications are planned. |
| Impact | Two training sessions. A podcast. A list of recommended materials for acquisition and exhibition display. |
| Start Year | 2023 |
| Description | New Materialist Approaches to Research in Children's Cultures |
| Organisation | University of Wroclaw |
| Country | Poland |
| Sector | Academic/University |
| PI Contribution | This collaboration has been initiated in the frame of the awarded project to further develop the theoretical and conceptual developments about the notion of children's cultures that appears in it. We have engaged in different activities to further develop this. We have hosted a research stay of Dr. Deszcz-Tryhubczak at the University of Glasgow from the 15.8 to 30.8 and organised a organised a workshop with other researchers working with similar theoretical frameworks. |
| Collaborator Contribution | They are organising a seminar on children's culture for the Antropocene in Poland to which Dr. García González has been invited. |
| Impact | The most important activity has been the publication of an open access book with 12 chapters by different scholars working in children's literature, media and culture with new materialist approaches. Disciplines involved: education, media studies, childhood studies, literary studies. We have also organised a workshop, a roundtable (forthcoming) and book launch (forthcoming) |
| Start Year | 2022 |
| Description | Abuela Grillo and the Possibility of Post Anthropocentric Narratives |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Presentation at an academic congress |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
| Description | BECOMING CHILDISTS! Decolonising the reading list |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | a talk in the frame of a Summer School |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
| Description | IBBY project in the spotlight: #EstoTbn's Children's Jury in Chile |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | An interview by a Egyptian scholar published in a Belgian website about reading promotion. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
| URL | https://www.iedereenleest.be/over-lezen/ibby-project-spotlight-estotbns-childrens-jury-chile?fbclid=... |
| Description | Interview about censorship |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | An interview at a national newspaper in Chile about the censorship of Anna Frank's diary in the USA. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
| URL | https://www.latercera.com/culto/2023/11/15/que-hay-detras-de-los-cuestionamientos-a-el-diario-de-ana... |
| Description | Online Talk in Puerto Rico |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Retos para la crítica de Literatura Infantil y Juvenil desde América Latina. Semillero de Literacidades Insumisas and Center for Latin American and Caribeean Studies of University of Indiana. February 24th. With Evelyn Arizpe. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2024 |
| Description | Posthumanist Concepts for More Response-able Research Practices |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Local |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Workshop Thursday 24th August Posthumanist Concepts for More Response-able Research Practices https://www.eventbrite.com/e/posthumanist-concepts-for-more-response-able-research-practices-tickets-667810006707?aff=oddtdtcreator Presenters: Dr. Justyna Deszcz-Tryhubczak (University of Wroclaw), Dr. Valentina Errázuriz (Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile), Dr. Macarena García González (University of Glasgow), Kerenza Ghosh (University of Glasgow) and Mar Sánchez (University of Surrey). In this workshop, we delve into how posthumanism and new materialism present conceptual openings for doing research differently. We will discuss the affordances and shortcomings of the concepts of "onto-epistemic injustice", "materiality", "care" and "assemblage". The workshop will be structured with short interventions of the five presenters opening the space for discussions about these and other posthumanist concepts. This workshop is aimed at staff and PGR. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
| Description | Sociomaterialist and Posthumanist Approaches to Research in Communication |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Local |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | A workshop on new materialist and posthumanist research practices for doctoral students that was open to other researchers as well. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
| URL | https://eventum.upf.edu/87998.html |