Glenda Mac Naughton

Consensus, Dissensus or Community: the politics of parent involvement in early childhood education

Parents appear in early childhood texts and policy documents within discourses that position them as ‘others’, preventing the creation of equitable parent—staff relationships. This article draws on discussions with early childhood staff to explore the implications of ‘othering’ parents and it canvasses two contrasting communication strategies through which to challenge this ‘othering’. The first strategy derives from Habermass modernist notion of communicative consensus; the second from Lyotards postmodern notion of emancipatory dissensus.

Early Childhood Professionals and Children's Rights: Tensions and Possibilities around the United Nations "General Comment No. 7" on Children's Rights.

Young children’s views are heard rarely in public debates and are often subordinated to adults’ views. This article examines how early childhood staff could support and enhance young children’s participation in public decision making. We argue that when early childhood staff use their expertise in young children’s physical, social and cognitive development to facilitate consultations with young children, they are likely to reinforce the view that young children are unable to form and express their own views. Whatever their intentions, this weakens the notion of children’s rights and undermines young children’s participation in public decision making. In contrast, when staff use their expertise in child development to collaborate with young children, new social structures can emerge in which everyone’s voice is heard. This approach reaffirms staff’s status as experts, but redefines their expertise. Instead of being experts acting on behalf of children, staff become equitable collaborators with children, advancing citizenship for all.

The Dynamics of Whiteness: Children Locating Within/Without

In this chapter we explore how discourses of whiteness construct and reconstruct diverse identities and possibilities for children in their worlds. We ask, what does this mean for early childhood? Do we need to rethink how we work with young children around the politics of “race” in order to create greater equity for all? As Foucault (1985) argued: There are times in life when the question of knowing if one can think differently than one thinks, and perceive differently than one sees, is absolutely necessary if one is to go on looking and reflecting at all. (p. 8)

Exploring “Race-Identities” with Young Children: Making Politics Visible

Politics is about power—the power to define the world and act in it and on it. Power is the capacity to exercise influence in the world about what is doable, permissible, desirable, and changeable in your lives. Inserting politics into the “racing” of children leads us to explore how power operates in young children’s lives as they construct their “racial” classifications, comparisons, preferences, and status assignments. It requires us to ask how children and others exercise power in defining and influencing what is doable, permissible, desirable, and changeable in relation to “race” in their lives. Three ideas about identity are central to putting politics into researching young children’s identities in order to acknowledge the complex dynamic of the social contexts in which they live, learn, and produce their racialized lives: Identity is chosen not fixed; it is therefore changeable. Identity is formed in and through discourse and therefore identity choices are limited or made possible through discourse. Identity is actively performed, not passively given.

Intersecting Identities: Fantasy, Popular Culture, and Feminized “Race”-Gender

In this chapter we explore in more depth how white discourses can work in children’s lives with a focus on the politics of young girls gender-“race” identities. From the earliest studies of “race” and young children’s identities (e.g., Clark and Clark, 1939; Horowitz, 1939) researchers have studied the differences between the racial preferences and awareness of boys and girls. For instance, in the Clark and Clark (1939) study they found that the sex of the child mattered to what was found: The most significant aspect of the results … is the fact that the choices of the boys show significant trends whereas those of the girls seems to approximate chance. This fact can be best understood if it is remembered that the boys were making identifications of themselves while the girls were identifying brothers, cousins, and in a few instances a boy playmate. Because of this difference in response it would appear that either the technique used in this investigation has greater validity when used with boys than when used with girls, or that the dynamics involved when girls identify someone other than themselves is quite different from the self-identification of the boys. (pp. 596–597)

Introduction: Thinking Differently: The Call and the Desire

The idea that young children are innocent or ignorant about “race” and, therefore, are incapable of acting with “racial” intent is challenged in this book. We present empirical research evidence from several early childhood communities in Australia that children’s and educators’ lives are clearly “raced”; and we draw on this research and on decades of other international research and writing (Brown, 1998, 2001; Cannella and Viruru, 2004; Dau, 2001; Derman-Sparks and ABC Taskforce, 1989; Freire, 1970, 2002; hooks, 1994, 2003; Lane, 2008; Mac Naughton, 2005; McLaren, 1997) to explore the “racing” of young children. We use the term “racing” of young children to capture the complex and active individual and institutional sociocultural and political processes that form young children’s feelings, desires, understandings, and enactments of “race” in their daily lives.

Discourses of “Race” in Early Childhood: From Cognition to Power

As those two quotes illustrate, the question of young children’s “racial” identities and what young children know about “race” has a long history. Park’s statement is from his 1928 paper, “The Basis of Race Prejudice.” Park was an U.S. academic who was writing at a time when there was considerable theoretical and research activity about racial prejudice in the United States (e.g., Bogardus, 1925; Frederick, 1927; Reinhardt, 1928). However, this work primarily focused on studying racial prejudice in adults and college students (e.g., Young, 1927). Park’s paper broke this pattern by focusing on the development of prejudice and racial identities in young children. Eighty years later, we are still researching and theorizing about “race” and young children—asking what children know, when they know it, and how they come to know it. The intervening eighty years have seen the production of hundreds of studies about the “racing” of young children; and most of it has fundamentally challenged Park’s contention that young children are innocent of “race.” (We use the term “racing” of young children to capture the complex and active individual and institutional sociocultural and political processes that form young children’s feelings, desires, understandings, and enactments of “race” in their daily lives.)

Working Within, Beyond, and Through the Divides: Hopes and Possibilities for De-“Racing” Early Childhood

In this chapter we (the authors in this edited volume) come together to discuss our hopes and what we see as the possibilities for de-“facing” early childhood. We want to honor the diverse approaches and subjectivities we bring to working for the de-“racing” of early childhood without the demand and expectation of a consensus of opinions and ways forward in this work. We talk across and within our experiences as researchers (details of projects mentioned are in appendix), as educators of young children, as educators of preservice early childhood educators, and as agentic and subjective citizens. This chapter is loosely structured around our responses to each others’ chapters in the book and key themes that this process raised for us. We talk about: Thinking about researching children, “race,” and racism Engaging with racism Resistance to antiracism Engaging with “color-blindness” The disadvantages of “feeling comfortable” Studying white theories Problems with education?

Masculinities, Mateship, and Young Boys: Defending Borders, Playing Footy, and Kissing Meg

In chapter 4 we explored how whiteness constructed exclusions and possibilities in the “racing” of young girls’ identities. In this chapter, we turn attention to how white masculinities construct the “racing” of young boys’ identities. In particular, we look at how discourses of white, hegemonic masculinity create dynamics of inclusion and exclusion in an early childhood setting and how they can be used to sanction white boys who step outside of those discourses. Given discourses shape our sense of who we are, discourses of whiteness and masculinity embody a politics of identity that shape what boys understand what they can do, think, and feel, what they are permitted to do, think, and feel, what they should desire, and what they can change.