The social approach to childhood, though having earlier antecedents, flourished from the 1990s onwards in geographies of children, youth and families. Some researchers such as Matthews came to this from a history in children’s environmental cognition, but this shift in sub-disciplinary approach was also in large measure shaped by the advent of interest from new researchers with backgrounds in feminist, Marxist and post-structural approaches. This in part explains the lack of a hard-fought intellectual struggle over a ‘paradigm shift’: this new wave of researchers often took their inspiration from elsewhere (seeing spatial cognition as largely irrelevant to their concerns). This social approach to children’s geographies – which concentrated on understanding children’s experiences as subjects in the world, rather than their abilities to perceive space – was further fuelled by the changing global landscapes which have elevated children’s position on the political agenda.
This keynote explores the changing nature of children’s geographies as an academic project. It proceeds in four parts. Part 1 considers the shift away from research on children’s spatial cognition which envisaged the child in largely biological terms, and contemplates contemporary efforts to rework the nature/culture dualism. Part 2 traces the incorporation of new social studies of childhood into geography, emphasising the importance of children’s voices, their positioning within axes of power, and the need for quantitative and qualitative methods. Part 3 explores how feminist research led to interest in parents, educators and other actors/institutions which shape, and are shaped by, children’s lives. Part 4 ponders what children’s geographies might add to, and learn from, broader interdisciplinary debates, and the benefits and pitfalls of research impact. The conclusion argues that a well-informed appreciation of sub-disciplinary history provides a strong vantage point from which to engage with new ways of thinking.