CFP: Mapping the Landscapes of Childhood II

Mapping the Landscapes of Childhood II
A Conference Sponsored by the University of Lethbridge’s Institute for Child and Youth Studies (I-CYS)

Venue: The University of Lethbridge, Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada

Date: May 8-10, 2015

We take great pleasure in announcing the second Mapping the Landscapes of Childhood conference, and look forward to continuing the conversations begun at the first conference in 2011, which drew together an international group of 125 scholars. We aim to build on the success of our first conference, and to exploit the synergies within the U of L’s newly established multidisciplinary Institute for Child and Youth Studies (I-CYS). We therefore invite scholars and practitioners from a wide variety of academic disciplines (including the sciences, arts, humanities, social sciences, policy studies, social work, and education) to consider the state of child and youth studies, a vibrant and rapidly evolving field of inquiry.

Conference Format: Three days of multidisciplinary panels with scholarly presentations on conference themes; poster sessions; several keynote events; practitioner sessions; and a film screening.

Conference Themes and Questions:

  1. Appropriations of childhood

Recent concerns about cultural appropriation raise questions of identity, authenticity, power, and categorical integrity. Do these issues apply to studying and working with the young? How are children and adolescents appropriated for other projects? This theme asks fundamental questions about what young people are, what childhood and youth are, and what we think childhood, children, and youth ought to be.

  1. Is work the opposite of play?

Concern about the role of play in childhood and about the dangers of child labour are longstanding. Do they rest on unquestioned assumptions about what constitutes these categories of practice and experience? Do research and analysis reproduce these categories as two political, social, and experiential poles in the lives of the young? Is this useful or is it simply limiting? In addition, this theme also raises questions about what constitutes a ‘good’ or ‘natural’ childhood and adolescence, and how this relates to our understanding of what different life stages are ‘for’ across cultures, historical periods and evolutionary time.

  1. Does humanitarian aid help or harm children?

The welfare of the young is one of the most powerful motivators for intervention, whether national or international. How does humanitarian aid shape a global order and reproduce particular categories of young people? This theme links to our other themes by bringing into focus the ways that particular definitions are employed to assess the welfare of children and adolescents in (among others) demographic and health surveys, epidemiological studies, and public health initiatives. Could such strategies and interventions be improved by incorporating insights from basic research in areas such as anthropology, sociology and evolutionary demography, behavioural ecology, and comparative psychology and neurobiology?

Proposals for papers on additional themes also are welcome.

Keynote Speakers: 

  • Tim Gill, http://rethinkingchildhood.com/
  • Katie Hinde, Department of Human Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University
  • Jane Humphries, Professor of Economic History, All Souls College, Oxford
  • Karen Wells, Department of Geography, Environment and Development Studies, Birkbeck University of London

Submission Guidelines: 

We encourage single paper submissions to facilitate the construction of multidisciplinary panels. Proposals for multidisciplinary panels are also welcome. Graduate students are especially encouraged to contribute posters on their current research. A prize will be awarded for the best student poster.

Abstracts of 300 words for single papers and posters and of 500 words for panels can be uploaded to the conference website after September 1, 2014. The deadline for abstract submission is October 31, 2014. 

Please note presentations should be a maximum of 20 minutes in length. 

Anthropology of Children and Youth Seminar (Amsterdam)

Researching and Reporting on Human Trafficking with a Particular Focus on the Trafficking of Minors

Thursday 16 October 10.30-12.00, room Z-113, Metropolitan Building, VU University Amsterdam

Ieke de Vries
Researcher at the Office of the Dutch National Rapporteur on Trafficking in Human Beings and Sexual Violence against Children

There is increasing awareness of human trafficking in the Netherlands and at the international level. To tackle a hidden problem such as human trafficking, it must be made visible. A complicating matter is that human trafficking can take different forms, it can occur for different reasons, and individual traffickers as well as criminal organizations may be involved. The way governments or non-governmental organizations assess the criminal component also determines what measures will be taken to combat it. And even though there is more awareness, questions remain like: What is the role of researchers (both quantitative and qualitative) studying human trafficking and how do they contribute to the question of visibility? By means of concrete examples on human trafficking – with a focus on the trafficking of minors, the seminar will look into the various ways for researching the phenomenon.

VU University is located at a 10-minutes’ walk from Amsterdam Zuid railway station. The Metropolitan Building is located opposite the University’s main building, across the tramway. Tram stop ‘De Boelelaan / VU’ is served by tram lines 5 and 51.

Feel free to communicate information of this seminar to other people who might be interested.

Could you confirm your participation in the 16 October seminar to us? childrenseminar@hotmail.com

Full-Time Tenure-Stream Assistant Professor Position – Children’s Studies (Contemporary Global Youth Cultures) – York University, Toronto, Canada

The Children’s Studies Program, Department of Humanities, Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies, York University, Toronto, Canada, welcomes applications for a full-time, tenure-stream, Assistant Professor position in Children’s Studies (Contemporary Global Youth Cultures).  The application deadline is October 31, 2014, with a start date for the position of July 1, 2015. Continue reading Full-Time Tenure-Stream Assistant Professor Position – Children’s Studies (Contemporary Global Youth Cultures) – York University, Toronto, Canada

CFP: New Worlds of Adoption

CFP Launching into Adulthood

Calling all Presentation Submissions – DEADLINE – Nov 3, 2014
LEARN MORE & APPLY HERE

Keynote:

Ann Masten, Ph.D., University of Minnesota, will highlight research on resilience in development with a focus on transitions to adulthood. Dr. Masten will be joined by three adult adoptees who are now in significant professional positions serving the adoption community:

— Astrid Dabbeni, Executive Director of Adoption Mosaic, Portland, OR

— Judith Eckerle, M.D., Pediatrician and Director of the Adoption Medicine Program at the University of Minnesota

— Nathan Ross, Project Coordinator for the Community Champions Network at the North American Council on Adoptable Children (NACAC)

Conference will also include:

Panel Discussions, Topical Concurrent Sessions, and Posters Displaying Research and Programs.
Social Work CEU’s & Psychology CE’s will be available. 

Poster Submissions Welcome* – Deadline Jan 23, 2015
.
* Please refer to our website for information about scholarship, poster & presentation submissions. 

New release – Growing Up In Poverty: Findings from Young Lives

9781137404022Edited by Michael Bourdillon and Jo Boyden
Palgrave MacMillan, 2014

This new book brings together the latest findings from Young Lives on how poverty affects children’s development and how children and their families respond to poverty in their daily decisions and daily lives. The book shows how, amid general economic growth, many poor children are being left behind despite, the promises of the Millennium Development Goals. While the universalisaton of education now means that most children attend school, at least for a while, children from disadvantaged backgrounds often experience poor-quality education and learn least in school, creating inequality of opportunity.

Continue reading New release – Growing Up In Poverty: Findings from Young Lives

ACYIG blog needs you!

We welcome submissions from ACYIG members for our blog!

The blog is a less formal venue for budding ideas, thoughts on critical issues that might not fit elsewhere, and a time-sensitive way to engage with a broader community of scholars and the public.

The topics are open, but here are a few ideas and possible themes:
  • children/youth in the news — Experts on topics that are coming up a lot in the current news write about their take on current events, parse out the news coverage or what isn’t being addressed, give deeper ethnographic insight into what is at stake, perhaps provide historical perspective, etc.
  • important issues related to children/youth that are NOT in the news — Things we know about as researchers that we wish had media coverage, and why.
  • photography from the field / brief photo essays
  • questions of ethics and the IRB — specifically in relation to research with minors and protected populations
  • the “anthropology of childhood and youth” outside of typical anthropology departments
  • status and future of being an “anthropologist of childhood/youth” in the U.S.; job advice & related
  • “why study children?” – novel perspectives and creative applications for thinking about the relevance of our discipline
  • notes from the field — open-ended reflections on research w/ kids
  • kids’ perspectives on participating in research
  • childhood and youth in popular culture, etc.
  • summaries of discussions that occur on our listserv (or other such community resources)

Please note that submissions are screened internally and decisions about posting pieces are made quickly, so this is of course not a formal academic publication nor is it to be considered peer reviewed. It is, however, a great way to get more people to view your ideas and publicize your work, and to help publicize the anthropology of childhood and youth!

For more information on submitting to our blog, please contact Bonnie Richard at bonnie.olivia@gmail.com.