From Child’s “Voice” Authenticity to Researcher Reflexivity: a critical review

Abstract

The 1990s were marked by the dominance of developmental psychology paradigms and Parsonian-inspired socialization theories. In this context, a new movement emerged aiming to vindicate the historically constructed nature of childhood, recognizing it as a complex social institution reflecting a form of social division between children and adults characterized by unequal relationships. Initially presented as a new sociological paradigm for childhood, this movement gave rise to Childhood Studies (CS), also known in Latin America as “New Social Studies of Childhood”. This field adopted an early critical stance toward perspectives reducing childhood to a simple universal stage of individual psycho-evolutionary development. Recognizing power imbalances inherent to the interaction between adults and children, CS researchers committed to fostering children’s participation and leadership in research processes, asserting children as competent social actors. The development of research aimed at demonstrating child agency—that is, the active role of children in the production and transformation of societies—was a fundamental task in defining the disciplinary identity and expanding the field. In Latin American educational research, this particular understanding of childhood prompted researchers to produce knowledge with children, not “about” them. They also sought methodological strategies allowing children’s “voices” to be rescued and promote their participation in the production of knowledge relevant to the democratization and improvement of school life and educational processes. In an educational field historically dominated by adult perspectives, these initiatives played an important role in the social and political struggle to make children’s experiences and perspectives visible and valued. Recognizing the value of these contributions, it is possible to note that the discourse of children’s “voice” has been normatively established as a “master narrative”. We argue that this narrative operates as an institutionalized guarantee of research “horizontality” that weakens its initial critical and transformative stance. Considering that educational research requires a more theoretically and epistemologically sound use of the concepts used to address childhood, problematizing the complexities and limitations of the representation of children’s “voices” constitutes a significant challenge for researchers. Critically reviewing the use of the “voice” allows us to significantly interrogate our research practices and reflect about the possibilities and limits of discourses and theoretical frameworks sustaining these practices. This article develops a critical reflection.