| dc.contributor.advisor | Thørnblad, Jeanette | |
| dc.contributor.author | Skoglund, Jeanette | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2018-07-10T08:47:32Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2018-07-10T08:47:32Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2018-06-27 | |
| dc.description.abstract | Oppvekst i slekt er en praksisform som har lange tradisjoner i den private sfære. Slektsfosterhjem derimot, som kategori og tiltak i barnervernet er et realtivt nytt fenomen. I forskning har oppvekst i og blant slektninger primært blitt utforsket blant antropologer. Med institusjonaliseringen og kategoriseringen av slektsfosterhjem har fenomenet blitt aktuelt også innenfor barnevernrelatert forskning. Her har spørsmålene i stor grads rettet seg mot hvilke resultater slektsfosterhjem kan gi, hvilke utfall barn har, fordelene og bakdelene ved slektsfosterhjem også videre. Med andre ord, fenomenet har blitt studert mer som tiltak enn som familie. Hensikten med denne avhandlingen er å bringe familie tilbake inn i studiet av oppvekst i slekt, og med dette bringe fenomenet tiltbake ut i samfunnet. I den anledning argumenterer jeg for "oppvekst i slekt" som en alternativ konstruksjon. Hensikten med avhandlingen er å vise hva slags kunnskap konstruksjonen kan gi og hvorfor den er viktig for studiet av slektsfosterhjem som fenomen. Spørsmålene diskuteres på bakgrunn av de teoretiske perspektivene som konstruksjonen åpner opp for, samt to empiriske studier. Det empiriske materialet baserer seg hovedsakelig på kvalitative intervju med unge voksne (19-29 år) som har vokst opp i forsterhjem i egen slekt. | en_US |
| dc.description.doctoraltype | ph.d. | en_US |
| dc.description.popularabstract | How should kinship foster care be understood in research – as a service within child protective services or as upbringing by relatives? While the first understanding represents a positivist epistemology, the latter is based on an interpretive epistemology. Each of these understandings leads to different research questions and creates guidelines for what falls into or out of the focus of research. If we understand kinship care predominantly as a service within child protective services, this directs the researcher towards topics such as stability and breakdown, risk, effects and comparisons of kinship care with other services. Understood as upbringing by relatives, on the other hand, it opens up questions regarding how family, childhood and parenthood are negotiated and lived among woman and men, boys and girls. From this perspective, kinship care is not studied as a thing-like object, but as a context in which family life is practised. This construction builds on contemporary understandings of family found within the sociology of family life and makes theoretical and empirical studies from this tradition relevant to the study of kinship care. In other words, how we understand kinship care has major implications for what type of knowledge researchers produce.
In kinship care research, this phenomenon has primarily been studied as a service. In this dissertation I have used effect studies as a case to demonstrate the limitations of this construction in research. I show that a complex, varied and context-depended phenomenon is reduced to factors. The problem is not so much that researchers take on this understanding in research, but that the majority of studies represented in the knowledge production reflects this type of construction. As researchers we must acknowledge that we not only produce knowledge through our research, we also produce specific images. Because knowledge does not simply circulate within the field in which it is produced, but is used to inform child welfare workers, policy makers and bureaucrats, we should take seriously what images we promote through research. Moreover, because this understanding is based on a system conserving, preconstructed understanding, it limits the possibility of producing new knowledge. Put differently – because the construction leads us to ask field specific questions it makes it difficult to ask “new” research questions outside the realm of CPS. Rather, we end up recording the logic of CPS at a particular point in history. It serves as a documentation of the influence of the evidence-based movement and the aim to reduce randomness in decisions and to raise the quality of the provided services.
Based on these limitations, I show what type of knowledge we can gain from shifting our understanding of kinship care in research and why this is important. Drawing on qualitative interviews with children and young adults who grew up in foster care with relatives, I show that the construction allows us to explore kinship care in all its variability and complexity. Moreover, it allows us to explore what the formal aspect of kinship care can involve for how family life is practiced, and for how childhood is understood.
The researcher, child welfare worker, bureaucrat, policy maker and so on who thoroughly read the dissertation will not only be aware of that kinship care can be understood in different ways. He or she will also understand that each understanding has consequences. By acknowledging this, therefore, the researcher, child welfare worker, bureaucrat, policy maker and so will also need to make implicit and explicit arguments for the choices he or she makes: The choice between approaching kinship care as a service within child protective services or as upbringing by relatives – as family. | en_US |
| dc.description.sponsorship | RKBU Nord | en_US |
| dc.description | Papers I-III are not available in Munin.<p>
Paper I: Skoglund, J. & Thørnblad, R. (2017). Kinship care or upbringing by relatives? The need for ‘new’ understandings in research. Available in <a href=https://doi.org/10.1080/13691457.2017.1364702> European Journal of Social Work.</a><p>
Paper II: Skoglund, J., Holtan, A., & Thørnblad, R. (2017). The meaning and making of childhoods in kinship care – young adults’ narratives. Available in <a href= https://doi.org/10.1080/2156857X.2017.1422139> Nordic Social Work Research.</a><p>
Paper III: Skoglund, J., Thørnblad, R., & Holtan, A. Children’s relationships with birth parents deprived of parental responsibility. (Manuscript). | en_US |
| dc.identifier.uri | https://hdl.handle.net/10037/13201 | |
| dc.language.iso | eng | en_US |
| dc.publisher | UiT The Arctic University of Norway | en_US |
| dc.publisher | UiT Norges arktiske universitet | en_US |
| dc.rights.accessRights | openAccess | en_US |
| dc.rights.holder | Copyright 2018 The Author(s) | |
| dc.subject.courseID | DOKTOR-003 | |
| dc.subject | VDP::Samfunnsvitenskap: 200::Sosiologi: 220 | en_US |
| dc.subject | VDP::Social science: 200::Sociology: 220 | en_US |
| dc.title | Upbringing by relatives. Incorporating new understandings and perspectives into the study of kinship foster care | en_US |
| dc.type | Doctoral thesis | en_US |
| dc.type | Doktorgradsavhandling | en_US |
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