Kulturowe konteksty dzieciństwa. Szkice antropologiczno-pedagogiczne

Abstract

The monograph is devoted to a child and childhood in various socio-cultural situations, for which cultural and social difference is the common point of reference. The book is composed of two parts. The first part “Child – society:(multi)cultural formation of childhood” makes an attempt to recognize the child's experiences, which are produced at the point of contact/meeting/clash of societies and cultures, what "shapes" the child as a socio-cultural construct and childhood as a social practice and as part of culture in general. Part One begins with the chapter „Child – society – (multi)culturalism. Between wounded and/or broaden identity”. The authors try to recognize the "child" and "childhood" in relation to the cultural approach towards the relationship of "people you know" – "people you do not know". The authors are also interested in "Child" and "childhood" as products of social awareness. This approach allows to see both categories as socio-cultural constructs and it contextually sweetens them in a specific continuum of "broaden identity" - "wounded identity". In the chapter „Foreign child in a new country. „Culture clash” the main problems related to the child's functioning connected with the change of residence are discussed. The starting point is the analysis of the processes accompanying entering the area of the new culture. An important part of the chapter is the presentation of selected aspects of intercultural differences that construct the child's everyday life. The following chapter “Child – refugee. Childhood that was taken away (?)” focuses on the analysis of selected legal, social and cultural problems that often drastically reconstruct the childhood of refugee children. In the text, selected elements of knowledge in the field of satisfying the needs of the child are recalled and discussed in the context of the stages of psychosocial development of the child. On this basis, the authors present particular stages of „becoming” a refugee and they also discuss selected experiences of refugee children, which are often traumatic in their essence. In the chapter „Child in the social and linguistic context of parents' economic emigration” the linguistic, social and cultural experiences of a twelve-year-old child (Ukrainian boy) whose mother decided to emigrate (to Poland) became the subject of the authors’ interest. Analysis and interpretation of the child's migration experiences allow to see how his social and cultural awareness is being (re)constructed, and what decisions he makes in the field of cultural knowledge and skills within the Polish and Ukrainian cultures. Language beliefs created in the child's consciousness for Polish and Ukrainian languages are presented in this chapter as well as English and Russian ones. Based on them, the authors show educational choices in the field of Polish and Ukrainian languages and cultures which the child declared at the time of the study. The first part finishes with the chapter called „Situation of the child in the re-emigrants family. At home again (?)” It is an attempt to recognize a situation of the return that is psychologically and socially difficult for both an adult and a child. The chapter starts with a discussion on the re-adaptation of children’s parents. Special attention is paid to social and identity problems that accompany the return. Then, on this background, the authors analise selected issues of acculturation and (re)constructinn of the child's identity abroad and after migration. The second part of the monograph called „Child – Education: (multi)cultural processing of childhood” is an attempt to recognize a child as a participant of institutional (organized) educational situations. These - in the authors’ recognition - constitute a socio-cultural context of active childhood processing. The second part begins with the chapter „The child „thrown into the world”. Towards anthropological and cultural identity” in which the effort is made to recognize space as something geographical and cultural, and what can also decide about formation of an open or closed human. The relation "opening" - "closing" is an anthropological reference, with which a man has to face, because "he has been thrown into this world". The introduction of "anthropological and cultural identity "in this chapter is a condition for human openness to the multiplicity of cultures which can "give" a rational and (in some sense) affective inducement for constant expansion of one's identity. The next chapter „The Ethnic” child and school. Ethnicity as a source of suffering shows the process of creating a sense of identity based on the analysis and interpretation of biographical experiences of a ten-year-old ethnic child. These experiences are significant because the child, whose experiences have become the subject of the study, is brought up in a family, in the conditions of bilingualism and biculturalism. School – in the experiences of an "ethnic" child - may be a space in which a child gains the access to social knowledge which confirms or contradicts his or her home / family bicultural experience. The cultural difference, which is experienced by the child in school situations, valorizes his or her social behavior, constantly (re)constructs his or her understanding of himself/herself and the surrounding socio-cultural world and thus it constantly processes his or her childhood. The subsequent chapter „Child in a culturally diverse group. Contexts of intercultural formal education” concerns selected issues related to the processes of education and child’s integration in a culturally diverse group, and which are planned and implemented in the reality of the so-called formal education. The last chapter of the book not only closes the second part, but completes the fourth one. The text „Child – a participant of intercultural non-formal education” shows a child participating in educational initiatives of diverse character, whereby it is planned and implemented within the so-called intercultural non-formal education. In this chapter the authors present the established concept of intercultural informal education. For this chapter the authors chose these non-school education practises (initiated by NGOs) where educators try to perceive the child as a subject engaged in learning interculturalism by being in intentionally organized multicultural situations. Due to its subject matter, the monograph is a part of theoretical and practical field of broadly understood intercultural education. The authors have made an effort to recognize and understand the children's experiences generated by social situations and which are complicated by contexts and (multi)cultural problems. The book can also enrich the knowledge of these educational programs which aim is to create an attitude of openness towards cultural difference.