A few decades ago there was almost no geography research on children. Of course there have been pioneers like Colin Ward (1977) with his collection of studies in the much-cited book ‘The Child in the City’, Roger Hart (1978) groundbreaking research on children’s experience of place, and Kevin Lynch (1977) inspiring, international research on growing up in cities. But in fact, the relationship between childhood and the spatial environment only really received sufficient attention from the 1990s (Freeman, 2023). A distinction in this kind of research is often made (on the basis of Hart, 1984) between ‘geography of children’ and ‘children’s geographies’. The first one focus on children’s spatial behaviour. This more psychological approach examines for example children’s spatial cognition, mapping abilities, and their ‘freedom to roam’. Theories about spatial segregation and the ‘islanding’ of children’s spatial living environment emerge from this (De Visscher, 2008). The second is concerned with children’s own knowledge, understanding, meaning, and experience of the geographic environment. It looks - among other things - at the fundamental difference between the living world of children and that of adults and how they influence each other (Kong, 2000; De Visscher, 2008).
This summer I read the book ‘Children's geographies’, edited by Sarah L. Holloway and Gill Valentine (2000). The book is - as the title already revealed - part of the second discourse and appeared after research in this field had gained momentum. It deals with the more sociological interest of researchers in the social and spatial position of children in society and how children influence and manipulate the adult world where they live in. Part of this more sociological approach is the premise that children should be regarded as competent, social, active actors. In addition, the book renounces the dichotomy between the Dionysian (‘devils’) and the Apollonian (‘angels’) understanding of childhood by showing that children are socially constructed identities which come in all shapes and sizes, and varies with time and place. This informative book with fifteen chapters divided into three parts (Playing, Living, and Learning) addresses that diversity. Here is a summary of some chapters that particularly interested me as an urban geographer and researcher in the field of child-friendly environments.
Children’s places
Owain Jones shows in his chapter how children deal with the over-determined, regulated spaces in a small village in southwest England and how they reconstruct and reconfigure this adult space in their own terms. This mainly happens in what he calls disordered, polymorphic, manipulative, and permeable spaces where children create their own private, secretive places: “somewhere you can go and sit and talk away from everyone else” (p.35), as an 11 year old girls says. Adult geographies should therefore be less rigid and more heterogeneous and tolerant of otherness, he argues.
Samantha Punch conducted a study in rural Bolivia about the ways in which children devise ways to counteract adult’s power and control over their lives. Children’s free time is limited by their household duties, but at the same time, their spatial experience of the local environment is much greater, as they are often sent out to work for the family (looking after animals, fetching water). To escape parental authority and to satisfy the need to play, the children combine activities. Playing (and stalling) on their way from school to home or playing during worktime. Her plea is therefore to do more research into the overlap between different childhood activities.
Hugh Matthews, Melanie Limb and Mark Taylor use the concept of ‘interpretive reproduction’ to signifies that children are agents in their own development and in their own locality. Just like the young people (9-16 years old) they examined in three council estates in England. Contrary to many heard trends these children were highly visible on the ‘streets’, both boys as girls. It’s the place where they can meet up with friends, celebrate a developing sense of selfhood, and enjoy a range of activities, unhindered by adults (p.66-67): “the main activity reported by girls was talking and chatting with friends (46 per cent), whereas boys are more likely to see the ‘street’ as a venue for informal sports, such as football, skateboarding and rollerblading (50 per cent)”.
Tracey Skelton focuses on the question what white working-class girls (14-16 years old) from South Wales (UK) do when they are outside. Mostly they use the streets and parks as a social space - being together with friends - and a place to avoid domestic tasks and parent control. Their presence in public space sparks discussion with adults who believe they make too much noise or think they shouldn't be there. Touching on one of the most important and ancient discussions: for whom is the public space and how public is it?
Institutionalized leisure
John H. McKendrick, Michael G. Bradford and Anna V. Fielder show in their article about Manchester (UK) that playing no longer only takes place at home, at school or in the neighbourhood. At the beginning of this century, commercialisation of children’s play space was already in full swing with for example the arrival of indoor soft-play centres. A designated and safety approved site with fairly standardised equipment and adult viewing areas. For many children independent outdoor play has partly turned into an organized indoor activity (although this differs by age and economic class). At the same time we see that the former birthday parties at home have also moved to these commercial centres. Which is actually quite odd when you think about it: housing a private party in a busy collective play environment. This choice also largely comes from the parents: it removes the organizational concerns. You buy a complete birthday party with little to worry about and no mess afterwards, as I also know from my own experience :)
Elizabeth A. Gagen discusses the way children’s lives are closely orchestrated by institutional frameworks, containing assumptions how children should be socialised to adult norms (‘performativity’). On the basis of a historiography of the origins of the public, supervised playgrounds in Massachusetts (US) she gives insights how these playgrounds were used as a learning environment scripted by implicit gender norms through recreational practices by play leaders and through a spatial regime. These playground associations were founded at the end of the nineteenth century to keep children off the streets and inducting them into activities designed to promote certain behaviour. Painful is the way it was organized: 1) there were playgrounds for (immigrant) boys over twelve years old that was supervised by a male instructor and were devoted solely to sports to produce model citizens, encourage loyalty, and protectors of territory and property 2) there were playground for girls and boys under twelve, supervised by a female instructor, and with non-competitive activities like sewing, craft work, knitting and dancing. “Where the masculine notion stood for civic activity, the feminized nation stood for domesticity” (p. 291).
Fiona Smith and John Barker address another institutionalized leisure activity of children: out of school care. They describe how this service – primarily provided to cater for the children of employed parents - grew rapidly in Britain from the beginning of the 1990s. Childhood became more and more subjected to temporal control by childcare workers/playworkers and physically separated from the spaces of adulthood. The chapter shows how children - as active agents - experience, (re)interpret and (re)negotiate the social space of the out of school clubs. Because even though most of the activities are planned and organised by adult staff, children were redefining and adapting the envisaged pursuits. This is also apparent, for example, when you look at how children convert parts of the spatial environment into dens where the presence of adults is strictly prohibited.
Retrospective
All in all, a book that I enjoyed reading, because of the good substantive, introductory chapter and because the individual chapters with clear structures are easy to read. Although the book was published 23 years ago, it is still very interesting for researchers and practitioners for two reasons. Firstly, because it provides insight into (the origin of) a number of trends that still play a role in the upbringing of the child today (historical context). Secondly, many studies are still relevant because many factors are reviewed that still influence the lives and living environment of children. In combination with the diversity of research methods and case studies, it offers something for everyone who is interested in children’s geographies and social studies of childhood.
(c) Photos by Gerben Helleman
Literature
Freeman, C. (2020) Twenty-five years of children’s geographies: a planner’s perspective. Children’s geographies, 18 (1), 110-121.
Hart, R. (1978). Children's experience of place. New York: Irvington Publishers.
Hart, R. (1984). The geography of children and children's geographies. In: T.F. Saarinen, D. Seamon and J.L. Sell (eds) Environmental perceptions and behaviour: an inventory and prospect, Research Paper No. 209. Chicago, IL: Department of Geography, University of Chicago.
Holloway, S.L. & Valentine, G. (eds.) (2000) Children's geographies: playing, living, learning. Routledge.
Kong, L. (2000) Nature’s dangers, nature’s pleasures: urban children and the natural world. In: S.L. Holloway & G. Valentine (eds.) Children's geographies: playing, living, learning. Routledge.
Lynch, K. (1977). Growing up in cities: studies of the spatial environment of adolescence in Cracow, Melbourne, Mexico City, Salta, Toluca, and Warszawa. London/Paris: The MIT Press/UNESCO.
Visscher, S. De (2008). De sociaal-pedagogische betekenis van de woonomgeving. Gent: Universiteit Gent.
Ward, C. (1978). The child in the city. Architectural Press.
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