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More-than-childcare? Everyday, emotional geographies of a local Sure Start Centre

Horton, J. and Kraftl, P. (2007) More-than-childcare? Everyday, emotional geographies of a local Sure Start Centre. Paper presented to: First International Conference on Geographies of Children, Youth and Families, Reading, 17-18 September 2007. (Unpublished)

Item Type: Conference or Workshop Item (Paper)
Abstract: Since 1999, the UK Government’s ‘Sure Start’ centres have offered renewed childcare, education and healthcare facilities for the benefit of 0-4-year-olds in the 524 most ‘deprived’ wards in the UK. This paper re-presents findings from interviews undertaken with 150 parents/carers, during an evaluation of one Sure Start centre in Northamptonshire. We suggest that these parents’/carers’ – often deeply affecting – accounts of childbirth, parenthood and experiences of the Sure Start centre problematise many extant academic accounts of childhood and youth, in four senses. First: in evoking the complex entanglements of local social/familial relations and moral geographies which importantly configure motherhood and childhood in this context. Second: in voicing experiences and emotions which, although commonplace, often remain unspeakable in narratives of motherhood and childhood (namely depression, shame, anger, self-doubt and isolation). Third, more broadly: in articulating a range of spatialities, issues and attachments which – being ostensibly banal, everyday, fleeting and ineffable – often go unrecorded in accounts of childcare, education and healthcare. And, fourth: in asserting how such often-overlooked complexities, emotions and everyday spatialities matter, fundamentally and politically
Subjects: H Social Sciences > HQ The family. Marriage. Women > HQ767 Children. Child development
L Education > LB Theory and practice of education > LB1139 Early childhood education
H Social Sciences > HQ The family. Marriage. Women > HQ755.7 Parents. Parenthood
H Social Sciences > HV Social pathology. Social and public welfare. Criminology > HV697 Protection, assistance and relief > HV701 Children
Creators: Horton, John and Kraftl, Peter
Northamptonshire and East Midlands: Social Issues
Faculties, Divisions and Institutes: University Faculties, Divisions and Research Centres - OLD > School of Social Sciences (to 2016)
University Faculties, Divisions and Research Centres - OLD > Research Centre > The Centre for Children and Youth
University Faculties, Divisions and Research Centres - OLD > Faculty of Education & Humanities > Education, Children and Young People
Faculties > Faculty of Education & Humanities > Education, Children and Young People
Research Centres > Centre for Psychology and Social Sciences
Date: September 2007
Date Type: Presentation
Event Title: First International Conference on Geographies of Children, Youth and Families
Event Dates: 17-18 September 2007
Event Location: Reading
Event Type: Conference
Language: English
Status: Unpublished
URI: http://nectar.northampton.ac.uk/id/eprint/779

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