Conference Contribution Details
Mandatory Fields
Karin White/ Tamsin Cavaliero/Gwen Scarborogh
Happiness, Relationships, Emotion & Deep Level Learning
Managing Space and Making Culture
Dublin DCU
Invited Oral Presentation
2016
Optional Fields
European Early Childhood Education Research Association Managing space and making culture: mothering and childhood at the margins 1 International migration has resulted in a diversity of spaces and localities of childhoods and notions of upbringing. This research takes a closer look at motherhood outside the dominant culture and taken-for-granted notions regarding mothering, taking into account different ways of being a mother within a particular context, culture and space. Using an anthropological lens, it also examines, assumptions made about what is 'normal' in children's development and 'milestones' reached. 2 Already Margaret Mead's (1928) anthropological study 'Growing up in Samoa' critiqued the culture-bound shortcomings in psychological theories such as Hall's claim that stress was an inevitability of childhood, or Freud's Oedipus complex. In 1987, Le Vine challenged mother-infant attachment in his observations of Western Kenian Gusii parents in comparison with Boston middle-class parents and questioned the excessive claims of universality in fields of child development and parenting styles. Furthermore, Norman (1991) in his ethnographic research among a German community finds that the Bowlby-Ainsworth model of attachment does not allow for cultural variations. 3 This contribution offers contextualised knowledge and theoretical conceptual perspectives and discourses on mothering practices and childhood. 4 Ethnographic research takes place among a community of asylum-seeking mothers living in Irish direct provision, the Irish Traveller community and Canadian mothers. 5 Power-imbalance will be addressed through co-constructed research methods based on participatory action research; ethical guidelines of both colleges. 6 This research is in progress; findings will be discussed during the presentation. 7 There will be implications for policy and practice across the ECCE sector in addition to housing, employment, health and education policies.