Jean Carabine

'Constructing women': women's sexuality and social policy

There is very little material available which looks at the relationship between women and social policy within the context of women’s sexuality . Specially, the way in which social policy is constructed and the impact of prevalent ideologies of sexuality on that construction. Particularly lacking has been an analysis of the social construction of sexuality within social policy which demonstrates the ways in which popular and commonsense views of sexuality both implicitly and explicity inform social policy. This paper will present such an analysis illustrating that social policy , both as a framework of implicit and explicit rationales for action and as a discipline is socially constructed on the basis of normative rules the rules concerning sexuality. In suggesting a sexual social construction of social policy heterosexuality will be posited as a central ideological theme running through social policy and intermeshing with ideologies of the family and motherhood. THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF SOCIAL POLICY This is a general paper concerned with examining the relationship between women’s sexuality and social policy. Central to this work is an analysis of the social construction of social policy as it relates to sexuality. This paper will focus on the impact of heterosexuality and its interaction with ideologies surrounding motherhood and the family. Extensive research showed this to be an area not looked into by either mainstream or feminist commentators on either social policy or sexuality. Existing feminist material on women and social policy, male and female sexuality and social control suggests a plexus of inter-relations which both influence and structure, not only each other, but also male/female power relationships generally. Given this, I was concerned with the question; what are the implications of this for social policy analysis? Although, feminists had written about sexuality and social control and women and social policy all had failed to make the crucial link between women, sexuality, social policy and social control.

New Labour's teenage pregnancy policy: constituting knowing responsible citizens?

This chapter explores the changing governmental approach to the problem of teenage pregnancy in the UK. It argues that there has been a shift from moral traditionalism towards individualized approaches based on promoting responsibility, agency and prudent choice-making. New Labours approach to teenage pregnancy marks a decisive turning point in governmental regulation, documenting the failure of previous approaches and establishing three distinctive discursive strategies: 1. risk management through knowledge acquisition; 2. constituting active knowing welfare citizens; 3. reconstituting blame. The paper ends by examining how this approach forms part of New Labours combined and contradictory project of ‘modernizing the social’ and ‘remoralizing welfare’.

In the Studio: Researcher Subjectivity, the Infant Observation Method, and Researching Creative Practices

The material for this article is taken from a psychoanalytically informed psychosocial pilot – Creative Practices and Processes that explores ‘what makes creativity possible?’ The aim of the pilot was to develop a methodology and methods that permitted an in-depth understanding of the social, psychological and material factors that facilitate creativity. The study is informed by a broadly post-Kleinian British Object Relations approach which privileges personal experience, unconscious dynamics, and the relationship between inner and outer worlds. The focus here is with the adaptation and innovative use of psychoanalytic infant observation as a psychosocial research method of ‘being with’ an artist in such a way as to gain a deep understanding of the unconscious dynamics, physical and material, spatial and temporal, and embodied experiences of creative processes and practice. The article considers the potential of psychoanalytic infant observation as a research method for informing us about creative practices and processes. The rich detail of the data is also explored for what it tells us about the research process and relationships. A key principle of infant observation is the importance of a ‘form of knowing imbued with emotional depth’ (Hollway 2012: 25) and the use of the observers subjectivity. The article illustrates how when the researchers subjectivity is utilised as a research tool and the researcher is open to the affective experiencing of the research process, looking and observing are not simple or straightforward research activities. Rather, we can see that they are activities that generate emotional responses, conflict, uncertainty, unease and not knowing. Using the first artist observation as an example, the research dynamics the observation are seen as involving a series of negotiations, enactments and explorations around boundaries, looking and being seen, what to observe, roles, the nature of the research and, anxiety.