Eclipsing Voice in Research with Young Children

Abstract

This article examines two vignettes taken from a research project designed to give voice to children's understandings of equity and social diversity in order to raise questions about how this project potentially reinforced inequities in children's lives. A rhizoanalysis of the vignettes is used to raise questions about how young children perform diverse discourses of ‘race’. This paper specifically focuses on the extent to which some of the voices produced in the research colluded in the production of racist and sexist practices. It uses this focus to raise questions generated through the rhizoanalysis for researchers who want to give voice to young children. Specifically, it asks if it is time for researchers to move beyond a concern for children's ‘voices’ and towards transforming inequitable power relations in our research with them.