When intersectionality met childhood studies: the dilemmas of a travelling concept

Abstract

Childhood studies/geographies have a longstanding interest in questions around multiple social inequalities and identities in diverse socio-spatial contexts, but have not yet seriously considered the politics of intersectionality. Importing intersectionality into childhood studies is neither a straightforward nor an unproblematic process. We suggest that the question that childhood studies/geographies scholars must confront is how intersectionality can be used in this interdisciplinary field in ways which recognise and take seriously the intellectual history and labour of Black women and preserve the integrity of intersectionality’s radical praxis of emancipatory knowledge production and collective action for social justice. This article examines how intersectionality and its emancipatory politics might be preserved, strengthened and enhanced when it is operationalised in a context of childhood studies/geographies.