Suchergebnisse

This article explores the ways in which discourses of whiteness and childhood intersect in Arundhati Roy's novel The God of Small Things to position the Indian children in the novel in inferior relation to the figure of the white child. Drawing the novel into discussions of the ideal of the universal child that shapes hegemonic educational and international development responses to children, the author suggests that the discursive dominance of such a child figure is radically disempowering for the child who is not contained within its boundaries. In The God of Small Things the Indian twins' experiences of ontology are consistently rendered invalid and inauthentic by the spectre of the white child, who appears as their British cousin, Sophie Mol. The author argues that the figuration of the child in this novel highlights the ways in which the universalism of the white child can work to exclude childhoods that exist outside this normative position. At the same time as it draws out the politics of exclusion, the novel can be seen to posit an alternative way of performing/enacting childhood subjectivity, which allows for multiplicity and the privileging of difference.

"The 'poor child' at the centre of development activity is often measured against and reformed towards an idealised and globalised child subject. This book examines why such normative discourses of childhood are in need of radical revision and explores how development research and practice can work to 'unsettle' the global child. It engages the cultural politics of childhood - a politics of equality, identity and representation - as a methodological and theoretical orientation that opens up for discussion the multiple ways that education, poverty and development bear on the 'poor child'. This book brings multiple disciplinary perspectives, including cultural studies, sociology, and film studies, into conversation with development studies and development education in order to provide new ways of approaching and conceptualising the 'poor child'. Research draws on a range of methodological frames - such as poststructuralist discourse analysis, arts based research, ethnographic studies and textual analysis - to unpack the hidden assumptions about children within development discourses. Chapters in this book reveal the diverse ways in which the notion of childhood is understood and enacted in different national settings and through different cultural, policy, and educational practices, exploring the complex constitution of children's lives - materially, culturally, and educationally. With a focus on children's experiences and voices, the volume shows how children themselves are challenging the representation and material conditions of their lives. The 'Poor Child' will be of particular interest to postgraduate students and scholars working in the fields of childhood studies, international and comparative education, and development studies"--

Reimagining an Australia where diversity and difference are welcomed rather than feared holds particular challenges for academics charged with the task of educating new undergraduate students who have been raised on a diet of conservative binary discourses and fear-inducing political slogans. This paper reports on the thinking we have done and on the practices we adopt to create a one-semester undergraduate unit on working respectfully and inclusively across diversity and difference. The unit is designed for delivery to students who will be working as professionals in contemporary Australia. Although our unit is currently being taught to students in the human services and community development areas, it can be tailored to suit students bound for any professional arena including teachers, health workers, engineers, social workers, psychologists, business executives, musicians and media commentators.

Intro -- Negotiating Childhoods -- Table of Contents -- Preface -- PART I: Childhood and Agency: Rethinking Adult-Child Relationships -- Perspectives of Disabled Childhoods: Listening to Inarticulate Children and Young People -- Children Talk: Children's Interpretation of Childhood -- Sexualising Citizenship? A Critical Consideration of Contemporary Youth Policy in the UK -- Just Testing: Adult-Child Relationships and Comedy as Empowerment in the Work of Andy Griffiths -- Shifts and Shapes of Emotion: Middle School Students' Perspectives at San Roque -- PART II: Historical Sightings of the Child -- Conceptions of Children and Our Obligations to Them: Multifaceted Perspectives from Judaism and Christianity -- The Influence of Early Modern Epistemology on the Education of Girls in Eighteenth-Century France -- From Disciplined to Spontaneous Child: The Evolving Models of Childrearing in Soviet Parenting Manuals during Post-Stalinism -- Childhood and Pedagogical Theory in Greece (19th - First Decades of the 20th Century): From the 'Little Adult' to 'Child's Psychology' -- From Physical Recreation to Digitisation: A Social History of Children's Games in the Philippines -- PART III: Risky Children, Children at Risk: Vulnerable Children and Ideas of Innocence -- Child Victims before the International Criminal Court: Avenue to Justice for the Most Vulnerable? -- India's Child Labor Policies: Their Implementation within the ILO Framework -- Dangerous Childhood? Constructing Risk and the Governance of Teacher-Student Interactions -- The Child and the Maniac: Unsettling Discourses of Childhood Sexual Innocence in Ian McEwan's Atonement -- Meeting Childhood Needs: The Need for Humour in Children's Literature -- PART IV: Child as Self, Child as Other -- Remembering and Creating Childhood in the Works of Ingmar Bergman and August Strindberg.

Are there ladies and gentlemen in the 21st century? Do we need them? In the 20th century, lady became particularly unpopular with second wave feminists, who preferred 'woman'. Gentleman was seen as similarly politically incorrect: class, race and culture bound. Following previous research on the word lady, we explore here some current evocations and debates around these words. We consider how the more casual, etymologically gendered term 'guy' has been utilized for men and women, and how it functions to reflect and obscure gender. While the return of the lady might be considered a consumer fad, a neo-conservative post-feminist backlash, or nostalgia for an elite 'polite society', it also offers an opportunity for a deeper discussion about civility as part of a broader conversation that is gaining impetus in the Western world. Politeness is personal and political. Whilst evidence for a comeback of the gentleman is limited, we critically consider the re-emergence of the lady as reflecting a deeper desire for applied sexual and social ethics. Such gender ethics have global, social and cultural ramifications that we ought not to underestimate. The desire for a culture of civility is gaining momentum as we are increasingly confronted with the violent consequences of a culture without it.