Abstract
This conceptual paper responds to contemporary concerns with research involving migrant children and childhoods in an Australian context. Migration is increasing across the world and researchers and teachers’ attention is being drawn to how we can best respond to the cultural wellbeing, identity and belonging of young children. Here, we ask the question: who is ‘the migrant child’? In our response, we disrupt expectations that are simplistic, homogeneous in views of children of migrant families or backgrounds, including confronting such notions as vulnerability, neediness and a deficit approach. Adopting a feminist, post-structural and posthuman theoretical framing we draw on Julia Kristeva, Gilles Deleuze and Rosi Braidotti to argue for foregrounding the complexities regarding conceptions of migrant children’s powerful and agentic engagements. Potential ways in which ‘the migrant child’ is implicated by diverse social, environmental and political factors are considered. These include the variety of ways in which children might demonstrate their autonomy and participation. In Australia contemporary migration discussions remains clouded by policies such the overturned ‘White Australia’ policy and more recently, the so-called ‘boat turnbacks’. Australia simultaneously depends on migrant workers in many fields and celebrates what is superficially seen as ‘successful’ multiculturalism. These multiple perspectives offer a deeply concerning social and policy context for researchers. It is in this context that we raise questions and speculate towards potential conceptualisations of ‘the migrant child’ which recognise, rather than negate, the powers and insights arising from the child’s experiential, relational and deeply entangled onto-epistemological perspective/s.
Presenters
Nicola YellandProfessor of Early Childhood Studies, Melbourne Graduate School of Education, The University of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia Kylie Smith
Professor, Melbourne Graduate School of Education, University of Melbourne, Australia Sonja Arndt
Lecturer, Melbourne Graduate School of Education, University of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
2024 Special Focus—The World on the Move: Understanding Migration in a New Global Age
KEYWORDS
Migrant Child, Global Childhoods, Poststructural Perspectives
