Professor Anna Tarrant, Professor of Sociology in the School of Social & Political Science and a UK Research & Innovation Future Leaders Fellow, gave the July seminar ‘Using co-creation in a qualitative longitudinal programme of research to affect social change – methodological innovations in research with marginalised fathers’. (There is a recording of the seminar below).
Anna is director of Following Young Fathers Further, a qualitative longitudinal and participatory study of the parenting journeys and support needs of young fathers (aged 25 years and under). She is author of books including Fathering and Poverty (Policy Press) and Men and Welfare (with Ladlow and Way, Routledge).
The presentation provided an overview of the methodological advances developed through over a decade of research with men in low-income families. Despite the dominance of absent father discourses in policy and practice, that typically accrue to men in low-income contexts, academic research about fatherhood has rarely engaged empirically with ‘non-hegemonic’ fatherhoods, namely those intersected by age, class, race and so on. Identification of this empirical lacunae prompted a methodological journey driven by an attempt to ‘recover’ these ostensibly ‘missing’ men through an examination of their family participation over time and across the lifecourse. Discussed were an evolving repertoire of methods, supported by a qualitative longitudinal research programme, that has advanced participatory methods including co-creation. Using examples from the study Following Young Fathers Further, this methodology has underpinned and prompted new and emerging dialogues, first with data and then with gatekeepers and participants. These methods constitute the evidence, conditions, and strategies for developing new forms of meaningful engagement with men, as well an evidence base established with professionals who seek to support them.
All are welcome, if you would like to join any of our seminars, please contact sbowler@lincoln.ac.uk or LEllis@lincoln.ac.uk