Rethinking Spatial Socialisation as a Dynamic and Relational Process of Political Becoming

Abstract

In this paper, I set out to bring early political development back to the research agenda in childhood studies as well as to the social scientific inquiry more generally. Proposing a geographical approach, I seek to develop the concept of spatial socialization as a dynamic and relational process through which political becoming takes place. Contrary to conventional conceptions, I present children as participants rather than as recipients of socialization--active agents in their everyday environments alongside their adult authorities, institutions, the media, and their communities as a whole. Moreover, drawing from phenomenological theorizations of subjectivity, politics and space, the employed approach problematizes the worlds in which political socialization takes place. I argue that the dynamic processes of socialization constitute the spatial realities where children and youth lead their as much as they constitute the youthful subjects they involve.