ChildAct16 | Shaping a Preferable Future: Children Reading, Thinking and Talking about Alternative Communities and Times

Summary
Despite overall agreement that children’s voices matter in the development of policies affecting them, little effort has been
made to develop cultural practices encouraging utopianism as a critical attitude to reality and a means of facilitating the
expression of formative opinions on the part of children. Nor have young readers’ interpretations of utopian literature been
investigated as indicating their perception of the sociopolitical arrangements around them, including the context of the EU.
Notwithstanding the popularity of YA dystopian fiction, little attention has been given to utopian contents in other children’s
texts. A specialist in children’s literature studies and utopian studies, Deszcz-Tryhubczak addresses these lacunae in a
project examining utopianism as a significant element of discourse about children, manifesting in various cultural products
addressed to them. She also conducts empirical participatory research (with children as peer researchers) aimed at creating
egalitarian spaces within which young readers are not only heard but also collaborate with adults towards a better
understanding of how books shape ideas for the desirable future. This approach—an innovation in children’s literature
studies—has a huge potential for making children’s literature scholarship relevant to young people’s lives as a cultural
practice sustaining intergenerational dialogue. Thus this project is challenge-based and integrates unprecedentedly
children’s literature studies, empirical studies of literature and media, utopian studies, and childhood studies. The fellow will
publish its results in one article and a co-edited a collection. She will organize a colloquium for international scholars. Her
stay at Anglia Ruskin will be crucial in her obtaining full professorship and in her leading a children’s literature research
center in Poland. No secondment is proposed, but the research and public outreach activities provide opportunities to
expose her work to the public.
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More information & hyperlinks
Web resources: https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/745888
Start date: 21-08-2017
End date: 20-08-2018
Total budget - Public funding: 97 727,40 Euro - 97 727,00 Euro
Cordis data

Original description

Despite overall agreement that children’s voices matter in the development of policies affecting them, little effort has been
made to develop cultural practices encouraging utopianism as a critical attitude to reality and a means of facilitating the
expression of formative opinions on the part of children. Nor have young readers’ interpretations of utopian literature been
investigated as indicating their perception of the sociopolitical arrangements around them, including the context of the EU.
Notwithstanding the popularity of YA dystopian fiction, little attention has been given to utopian contents in other children’s
texts. A specialist in children’s literature studies and utopian studies, Deszcz-Tryhubczak addresses these lacunae in a
project examining utopianism as a significant element of discourse about children, manifesting in various cultural products
addressed to them. She also conducts empirical participatory research (with children as peer researchers) aimed at creating
egalitarian spaces within which young readers are not only heard but also collaborate with adults towards a better
understanding of how books shape ideas for the desirable future. This approach—an innovation in children’s literature
studies—has a huge potential for making children’s literature scholarship relevant to young people’s lives as a cultural
practice sustaining intergenerational dialogue. Thus this project is challenge-based and integrates unprecedentedly
children’s literature studies, empirical studies of literature and media, utopian studies, and childhood studies. The fellow will
publish its results in one article and a co-edited a collection. She will organize a colloquium for international scholars. Her
stay at Anglia Ruskin will be crucial in her obtaining full professorship and in her leading a children’s literature research
center in Poland. No secondment is proposed, but the research and public outreach activities provide opportunities to
expose her work to the public.

Status

CLOSED

Call topic

MSCA-IF-2016

Update Date

28-04-2024
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Horizon 2020
H2020-EU.1. EXCELLENT SCIENCE
H2020-EU.1.3. EXCELLENT SCIENCE - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
H2020-EU.1.3.2. Nurturing excellence by means of cross-border and cross-sector mobility
H2020-MSCA-IF-2016
MSCA-IF-2016