Childhood publics and everyday politics in childhood
We are pleased to announce a seminar by Dr Sevasti-Melissa Nolas (Sussex University), as part of our series "Citizen participation in health: critical perspectives" co-hosted by King's College London and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine.
'Childhood publics and everyday politics in childhood: thinking about implications for children's participation in their health care'
Since the ratification of the UNCRC (1989) huge progress has been made in involving children and young people in decisions regarding their health and social care. These developments have taken place in tandem with the rise of contemporary 'service user and carer involvement' groups and the investment by successive UK governments in an infrastructure for public participation. Yet how much is known about how children and young people are enlisted into cultures of participation in their everyday live, or put otherwise: how does a political orientation emerge in childhood? The presentation will focus on the ERC funded Connectors Study, a cross-national qualitative longitudinal study that explores the relationship between childhood and public life focusing especially on how an orientation towards social action emerges in childhood. Following 45 children aged 6-9 at the time of recruitment to the study, who live in different areas of three international cities (Athens, Hyderabad and London), the study explores children's encounters, experiences and engagement with the things that matter to them asking questions about what social action might look like in childhood and how children are recruited into social action. These are lines of analysis with implications for thinking about children and young people in the here-and-now (e.g. participation in institutions and decisions that affect them) as well as in the future (political activism across the life-course).
Places are limited - sign up email below.
The event will be followed by wine and nibbles.
Citizen participation in health: critical perspectives - Seminar Series
This series brings together social science expertise to reflect critically on policy and practice of citizen participation in health systems. It draws on critical conceptual framings of participation and in-depth empirical work from the UK and elsewhere. The series aims to focus particularly on the political economy of patient participation in the NHS, the construction of neoliberal patient-professional roles, the emergence of new spaces of citizen engagement in response to the marketization of health, and the relevance of global social movements and health activism to contemporary health systems.
The group is supported by the King's Interdisciplinary Social Science Doctoral Training Centre
Admission