Anglia Ruskin University

June 18 2013 - Lunchtime Seminar

"Young People, Identities and Citizenship in contemporary Ireland"

On a visit to CYRI from the Children and Young People Research Cluster at the Institute for Social Sciences in the 21st Century, University College Cork, Liz Kiely and Caitríona Ní Laoire will speak briefly about child and youth research at their institute and will present some of their own research. They will focus on two key but very complicated concepts relevant to research relating to children: identities and citizenship. Caitríona Ní Laoire will speak about her research on identities and belongings with children in returning Irish migrant families. She argues that the use of multiple and participatory methods in research with young migrants allows participants to express multiple identities and complex narratives of self, and highlights the implications of using particular oral and visual research methods in the research relationships with young migrants and their parents.

Liz Kiely, will acknowledge the disruptive moments in the Irish sex education landscape in recent decades, which have shifted the discourses away from protectionism (which constructs children as innocent, who can be damaged by explicit information on sexuality) towards sexual citizenship (where children are given formal sexual education so that they can keep themselves safe and healthy). However, what Liz Kiely will be claiming is that this constitutes a limited version of sexual citizenship, one which is individualistic in focus and narrowly conceived. She will acknowledge that while the official Irish sex education discourse is perceived as progressive, primarily because of the challenge it poses to the dominance of a Catholic discourse in the field of sexuality education, it has its limits. She will show how it is limited in its discursive framework, in the kinds of sexual subjectivities it makes available to young people to take up and in the kind of ethical project it can facilitate. She will consider how we might conceptualise children's sexual citizenship differently to generate a more exciting and democratizing learning environment and to open up ideas about different ways of being in the world.

Venue: Cambridge campus, room COS109
Date: Tuesday 18 June 2013
Time: 12noon to 2pm. Lunch will be provided

To book a place please email cyri@anglia.ac.uk

Elizabeth (Liz) Kiely is a senior lecturer in social policy in the School of Applied Social Studies in University College Cork, Ireland and she is a member of the ISS21 children and youth research cluster in the same university. She is currently working on a Department of Children and Youth Affairs funded project on the sexualisation and commercialisation of children in Ireland and her PhD thesis was on the topic of Irish school based sexuality education.

Caitríona Ní Laoire is a lecturer in Applied Social Studies and is also Deputy Director of ISS21 at University College Cork. Her research interests lie in the areas of migration and childhood and her recent research explores the experiences and identity processes of children who move to Ireland with their return migrant parent(s), focusing in
particular on family and peer dynamics, negotiations of
inclusion/exclusion and identities, and on relationships with place.

Time To Change: A Critical Conversation about Teen Fiction and Children's Rights

Tuesday 25 June 2013, 7:30-9pm, Chelmsford Campus

• Are children and teenagers aware of their legal rights?
• Can fiction be successfully used to highlight children's rights and welfare issues?

Join the CYRI Senior Research Fellow Dr Darren Sharpe, and authors Liz Fisher-Frank and Phil Earle for a critical discussion of teen fiction and children's rights. This is an excellent opportunity to join the debate about children's rights and the place fiction can play in raising awareness of rights amongst young people and others involved in children's issues.

Liz Fisher-Frank is a solicitor who for many years specialised in representing children. Much of her work has been for young people in or leaving care, the homeless and those facing family problems. She has also campaigned to help improve access to the law for young people. Liz now writes books and plays connected to her previous work. Her most recent book, Losing Agir, was inspired by a real human rights case and involves a young person in care and a child smuggling ring.

After leaving university, Phil Earle spent three years working as a care worker in a residential children's home, before training to be a drama-therapist at a therapeutic unit in South London. It was these experiences that inspired him to write his first two novels, Being Billy and Saving Daisy, both focusing on teenagers in the care system. Phil believes that teen fiction can play an important role in giving 'forgotten children' a voice.

For further information and to book your place please contact Rachel Moss rachel.moss@anglia.ac.uk

CYRI Critical Friends Writers Group

Colleagues and PhD students are invited to bring a current piece of research writing to share with a 'critical friend'.
These meetings will be held on the first Wednesday of every month. See the table below for details.

For further details contact cyri@anglia.ac.uk

Summer 2013 Dates

Wednesday 5th June 2013	12noon to 1pm	SAW003
Wednesday 3rd July 2013	12noon to 1pm	SAW003
Wednesday 7th August 2013	12noon to 1pm	SAW003

Participatory Inquiry Forum

The next Participatory Inquiry Forum is to be held on Wednesday 19th June 2013 from 1pm to 3pm in room MAR112, Marconi Building, Chelmsford campus.

The Forum is open to staff and students who are interested or actively involved in undertaking, promoting and/or supporting participatory approaches to research, for example; action research, co-operative inquiry, practitioner research or user-led research. In this, the second session of 2013, discussion will be about the involvement of young people in participatory research. There will be two speakers to stimulate the discussion:

"Involving young people in setting a research agenda"
Dr Susan Walker, Senior Lecturer in Sexual Health, Dr Allister Butler, Head of Department Community, and Family Studies and Daragh McDermott, Senior Lecturer in Psychology.

'The use of participatory principles in researching young people's political literacy'
Karen Badlan, PhD student

To reserve your place please contact:
Niamh O'Brien: niamh.obrien@anglia.ac.uk

Please note places are free, but limited to the first 25 people.

For further information please contact Prof. Carol Munn-Giddings: carol.munn-giddings@anglia.ac.uk

Children and Young Peoples' Voice Research Group Meeting Dates

Please see below the 2013 dates for the Children and Young Peoples' Voice Research Group meetings for the 2012-13 academic year.

Wednesday 23 January 2013	3 - 5pm	SAW106c Chelmsford; COS109 Cambridge
Wednesday 10 April 2013	3 - 5pm	SAW106c Chelmsford; COS109 Cambridge
Wednesday 15 May 2013	3 - 5pm	SAW106c Chelmsford; COS109 Cambridge
Wednesday 31 July 2013	3 - 5pm	SAW106c Chelmsford; COS109 Cambridge

If you have any questions regarding the research group or the meetings please contact tim.waller@anglia.ac.uk