New perspectives on the positioning of parents in children’s bullying at school

Abstract

This article explores the subject of parents with respect to children’s bullying at school. The overarching claim is that parental agency and positions on children’s bullying at school are produced and made possible by an apparatus of multiple, concurrent forces that provide poor conditions for a constructive partnership between parents and schools in cases of bullying. This research adds to the existing literature in the field by suggesting that the connections between schools, parents and their children’s social behaviour at school must be seen as complexly entangled and involving a range of forces at local, societal and political levels. Furthermore, based on an emergent research design, the article contributes to the discussion of post-qualitative research, drawing upon varied, qualitative empirical material and analytically experimenting with combining Adele Clarke’s idea of situational analysis and Karen Barad’s concepts of intra-action and apparatus.