Playing with Names: How Children Create Identities of Self in Anthropological Research

Abstract

Children have long been present in anthropologi cal research but rarely does their involvement receive the criti cal attention that is given to adult participants. This paper examines what is revealed about the construction of identities of self when the research-related play of two girls in quite dif ferent ethnographic contexts is examined. Drawing on research in Bridgetown, Barbados, and Saskatoon, Canada, it is argued that through the playful search for a pseudonym, these two girls speak to issues of poverty and prostitution that highlight how they see, experience and contribute to the world around them as active agents, rather than passive recipients, of cul tural processes. are to be seen and not heard resonates today through out the many academic studies of global poverty, social adversity and personal despair. Heightening the visibility of children and persuading readers of the significance of the issue being discussed, images of children often emerge