Found childhood as a practice of child as method

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article presents the rationale for ‘found childhood’, a crossdisciplinary project mobilising the art practice of ‘found objects’ to attend specifically to found objects concerning childhood. Found childhood reflects an emerging approach, child as method [Burman, E. 2019. Fanon, Education, Action: Child as Method. Abingdon: BrunnerRoutledge], that interrogates both contemporary modalities of childhood and wider social relations disclosed by the prism of childhood. Narratives of visual records of a discarded/found childhood-related artefacts encountered in public space are presented and reflected upon, conceptually and methodologically. The approach combines debates on contemporary relationships constellated around childhood with social geographies of urban space, and its non-places, alongside narrative and walking methodologies as embodied practices giving rise to new modes of remembering. Framed around a specific example, its potential as a practical socio-spatial pedagogy is discussed as opening up forms and meanings of childhood in contemporary culture, and its material practice, helping expose normative assumptions and invite new modes of engagement.