The Centre for the Study of Childhood and Youth

5
th
International Conference Researching childrens everyday lives: socio-cultural
contexts
Tuesday 1
st
July Thursday 3
rd
July 2014

PLENARY ABSTRACT


Children's Everyday Citizenship Practices: Childrens Cultural Citizenship from
British Ethnic Minority Communities.

Dr Tom Cockburn
Reader in Social Sciences
Edge Hill University

Gerard Delantys (2003) influential work distinguished between disciplinary
citizenship, where one learns the norms of `right citizen participation to cultural
citizenship or the right to participate differently in the social institutions and culture of
the society. Here ones participation and contribution is recognised, even if ones
participation deviates from a given norm. This reflects the whole `linguistic turn in
social theory that is interested in the discursive ways in which children have been
constructed (such as constructions of incompetence, incompleteness, vulnerability,
becomings, danger, and so on) that marginalises children and patterns their
limitations as full participants in society. These limitations become further embedded
through the intersectional influence of gendered, classed, ethnic, faith and dis/abled
inequalities cumulative inequalities between different groups of children, giving rise
to degrees of development, protection and citizenship, that vary across childrens
childhoods (Devine 2011).

Many papers presented at conferences are interested in the everyday lives of
children and how they display agency in circumstances where they are assumed to
be shaped by dominant discourses; whether these dominant discourses come from
families, schools, the media, etc. This paper utilises the concept of cultural
citizenship and the emphasis on difference and respect to explore debates around
culture, cultural citizenship, multiculturalism and assimilation. The debates around
the `clash of cultures (Huntington, 1992) and `dissenting citizenship (Sunaina,
2009) are discussed in the view of the everyday practices of children from ethnic
minority communities in their homes and schools. Struggles for recognition and full
citizenship can be identified through childrens everyday practices in their homes,
schools and amongst their peers. This emphasises the multifaceted ways in which
childrens lives are lived that stand as a counter to the static stereotypes,
generalisations and fears that feed into the attack on multi-culturalism. Rather than
powerless `victims, children from ethnic minority communities display opportunities
of empowerment from within themselves and from their cultures.

References:

Delanty, G. (2003) `Citizenship as a Learning Process: Disciplinary Citizenship
versus Cultural Citizenship, International Journal of Lifelong Education, 22(6) 597-
605.
Devine, D (2011) Immigration and Schooling in the Republic of Ireland, Manchester,
Manchester University Press
Huntington, S. (1993) `The Clash of Civilizations, Foreign Affairs, 72(3) 22-49.
Sunaina, M. (2009) Migrant and Minority Youth in the US: Rights, Belonging and
Exclusion, Forum 21: European Journal on Child and Youth Research, No4, 117121.