Morgan Centre for the Study of Relationships and Personal Life Methodological Issues in Researching Childrens Kinship Jennifer Mason and Becky Tipper University.

Morgan Centre for the Study of Relationships and Personal Life

Methodological Issues in Researching Children’s Kinship

Jennifer Mason and Becky Tipper

University of Manchester

www.manchester.ac.uk/morgancentre

www.reallifemethods.ac.uk


Theoretical/Methodological Orientations

• How children aged 7-12 create kinship with others in their everyday lives.

• Intellectual/methodological influences:

– ‘New’ sociology of childhood – children’s agency, perspectives and experiences

– Sociological/anthropological approaches to kinship –negotiated, situated and lived out in relational practices

• Reflective methodological eye – capacity to ‘move and shake’ substantive or theoretical knowledge



Our research

• 49 children aged 7-12

Half middle class, half working class

18 boys, 31 girls

11 sets of siblings

Various religious, ethnic, family backgrounds

• 8 interviews with selected parents

• Tuning in to children’s kinship. Attentive to different possibilities, eg what it is, where it is located, who it involves. Exploratory, ‘outside-in’ view.

• Who matters, positively and negatively

• Individual ethnographic interviews at home

• Children’s photos, photo elicitation, ‘concentric circles’, drawings

‘Children Creating Kinship’: ESRC funded study, 2004 - 2006



What can our methods tell us about:

1. Kinship as genealogies and formal structures?

• Limits on children’s genealogical knowledge

– Some appear to have extensive knowledge of kin

– Inevitably, some will be unaware of existence of some kin

– Some know about kin, but are unsure which relative they are, or how they are related



Kinship as genealogies and formal structures

• Children’s reflections on gaps in their knowledge are illuminatingRilla: Well, there is other people that I love, it’s just that we don’t see them

often so we can’t, I can’t like talk to you about them cause I don’t really know lots about them.

Becky: Oh, OK. What kind of people is that?Rilla: Well, like my dad’s mum like, like my great great grandma. We went

and saw her at grandma and granddad’s for her birthday but we don’t usually, we never see her cause we don’t, I don’t really know where she lives or anything so we never see her. It’s not the same with

grandma and granddad cause, erm, I recognise like where we’re, if we’re half way I know there’s like what I recognise and stuff

(F, aged 7)




• When and how children seek clarification from parents and others is illuminating

Becky: So is Sharon mum’s sister, is that right?April: Yeah. She’s the baby of the family. Harvey: And our mum’s the - April: The middly. Harvey: They had a brother and he was called…April: Uncle… He likes cricket but we can’t remember his name. Harvey: I’ll ask mum. Mum!!! (Goes into house to ask mum, can be heard in background)

Mum, what one is it, the one that likes cricket… April: He’s a bit grumpy at times! Because when it’s -Harvey: (Returning) Uncle Max!April: Uncle Max. Harvey: And Reece. (To mum) Who was the other two?April: But when it’s like Firework Day, and Christmas, he gets a bit moody because he

wants to watch the cricket matches, on Sky!Harvey: (Calling out as he returns again) Cousin Reece and cousin Mia. Becky: Oh OK. Harvey: (Repeating what mum says) We don’t see them an awful lot.(Harvey M aged 8, April F aged 9)




• Children can tell us about ambiguities or complex and shifting boundaries and negotiated definitions

Becky: OK, and so of Holly and Wayne which one is related to your mum?Tamsin: They are both related really because Wayne and Holly are engaged,

but I’m not allowed to call him Wayne because Wayne is my proper uncle but she’s not my proper aunty. But I am allowed to call her Holly, but I stick to Aunty Holly not just Holly.

Becky: Oh I see. Oh right but with Wayne you are supposed to call him Uncle Wayne?

Tamsin: Yes because if I call him Wayne I get into proper trouble.Becky: From who?Tamsin: From everybody.(F aged 8)




What can our methods yield?

• Our study wasn’t designed to document children’s genealogies in a systematic or comprehensive way – and it doesn’t! But children can tell us quite a lot.

• Ethnographic interviews at home, especially where other people are present and sometimes get involved, help us to extend children’s genealogical accounts.

• Our methods can help us to understand how genealogical kinship is an interactive, relational, managed and negotiated set of constructions. We can understand something of how this works in real lives, eg stories, ‘straplines’ (‘the one who likes cricket’, ‘the grumpy one’).



What can our methods tell us about:2. Kinship as relationships and practices?

• Relationships aren’t individual property, nor are they common property – any one perspective (including children’s) will be partial and we can’t expect anyone’s perspective to do. But validity of understanding children’s perspectives.Abbie: Can you not show my mum and dad this (concentric circles map), because I’m

putting my grandma Irene separate to my grandma Joan.Becky: She’s separate? That’s fine, yes. Abbie: I still love my grandma Joan but I think I’m closer to my grandma Irene.

• Interviews with other family members is an option (eg Punch, Edwards et al, Brannen, Finch and Mason). Small sub-sample of parent interviews

• Situational/relational dynamics in ethnographic interviews at home

• Interviews with siblings (some separately, some together)

Are children’s perspectives enough to explore their kin relationships?



What can our methods tell us about:3. Kinship as situated interactions in place and time?

• Kinship is embedded in children’s everyday physical spaces.Evie: Yeah, well normally on my dad’s side, there’s my gran and granddad

and my cousins, then my great grandma. And they, my gran and granddad and my cousins... and my aunty, all live near the same villages. So we normally go up there for birthday parties or they sometimes rent cottages and stuff on holiday, so we’ll go up there. And last time they rented a bouncy castle, cause they’ve got a

massive garden about the size of a field! (Laughs). And they have a trampoline in it and everything.

(F aged 10)



Kinship as situated interactions in place and time

• Value of children’s photos, also spontaneous walking tours, household material objects.









• Value of photo elicitation, talking about absence as well as presence in photos

Chandani: She used to live in this house when she was a little girl. And there was a swing over there and he dad built her that, and when you gave me the camera I said ‘Dad!’ because my dad knocked the swing down - I said ‘Dad, why did you knock it down? I wanted to take a picture of it!’ because I haven’t got a picture of Vandan, so I said ‘oh why did you?- I wanted to take a picture of that!’ cause that was Vandan’s. Awww!

(F aged 8)




• Importance of multiple situated accounts, being attuned to jostling accounts, ‘real time’ instances and negotiations




Jake: I like it when Aunty Betsy is asleep because she is just sat there like that (imitates peaceful sleeping).

Martine: (Laughs) She’s funny sometimes…Jake: She’s not funny now.Martine: She thinks I’m her sister […] And she is singing away, she doesn’t

know what she is singing but-Jake: Yes, and last time I went she started crying Martine: She does.Becky: Did she? Why was she-?Jake: I don’t know, she just, I think she said ‘I don’t want you to end up like

this’ or something…And she started crying.Martine: I can’t see her saying that because she doesn’t really, she doesn’t like

know what she’s saying.(M, aged 9)



What can our methods tell us about:4. Kinship as embodiment and physicality

How relatives act, look, speak, physical interactions

• Communicating the visual and non-verbalJasmine: (…) He’s just weird, but he likes me the best. He does. He gives me hugs and I will say like ‘thank you’, he goes like that, and then like he will try, he is just a bit blurrggh. (Demonstrating granddad approaching and trying to hug/kiss her)Becky: He’s trying to kiss you?Jasmine: Yes.Becky: But you don’t like it so much?Jasmine: No because it’s like his lips just fold back just like that! It’s like

that and like that. Probably not that much but you know like- (demonstrates by pinning her lips back).(F, aged 10)



Kinship as embodiment and physicality

• The significance of embodied affinities

Becky: What is it that makes them particularly like brothers do you think?Harvey: It’s cause, I think it’s cause they’re both funny. Matthew Bennett,

when we’re always chasing him today, (crying out) ‘aaaaaaaaaaah!’ And Ryan always says this: (in funny voice) ‘Do you need hearing- aid?!’ (Laughter). He says (drawn-out, high-pitched voice) ‘Sweeeeeety-pie!’ (Laughter). Becky: is that what he says?Harvey: Yeah, then they always laugh…(M aged 8)




• The significance of physical interactionsBecky: How do you get on with Adam and [another uncle]?Reuben: It’s fun with Adam, cause we wrestle a bit! (Laughs)Becky: (Laughs) Does he do karate on you? Reuben: No, just wrestle. Once I pinned him to the ground, even though

he’s older! Yeah, cause he’s much older cause he’s my dad’s brother, so he’s… I don’t even study wrestling or karate. I don’t… [Detailed

description of how he can jump across the couch like a high jump]… If I had space for the run-up, without touching this bit, I could jump to

about there. Over it, I’d be like wheeeee! Sometimes I go on my side and I go a bit further (demonstrates by flopping on his side onto the couch). Becky: (Laughs). That’s great. And so you managed to pin your uncle down

too?Reuben: Yeah, I managed. Cause he pinned my, cause I was on the floor,

and he pinned my shoulder, (lying on the couch to demonstrate) and I rolled over and pinned him, but then he rolled over and pinned me!(M aged 8)




• Our different methods enabled us to pick up on the importance of the visual, embodied, physical elements of children’s kinship. Given the chance, this is something that children articulate loudly and clearly about kinship.

• Visual and audio analytical and data management methods (NVivo databites) assisted us in this process

• More generally, awareness of the importance of watching and listening for these for these elements as constitutive, not just illustrative, of children’s kinship.

What do our methods yield?



Concluding points and questions

• Creative repertoire of methods is important. But also more general tuning in on as many frequencies as possible. Ability of children to articulate verbally shouldn’t be underestimated either.

• Importance of methods that start from children’s thinking and experience, eg their photos, their non-verbal communications, their concerns with physicality in relationships. These have the capacity to ‘move and shake’ our substantive and theoretical knowledge.

• Importance of situated polyvocality of accounts in ‘real time’, of marginal commentaries, parallel asides and interruptions.

• Is there a tension, in practice or in theory, between this situated view, and the prioritisation of children’s experiences and their own versions? We think there shouldn’t be, but it is easy to design research that sees these as either/ors. Important to see the intellectual influences with which we began the study as interacting, not polarised.

• How much of this is specific to children’s kinship? We need to tune in on all frequencies with adults too!



THE END

Morgan Centre for the Study of Relationships and Personal Life Methodological Issues in Researching Childrens Kinship Jennifer Mason and Becky Tipper University.

Documents

study of relationships

personal life slide

genealogical kinship

related morgan centre

study wasnt

uncle wayne

background mum

proper uncle