Invisible in Plain Sight? Grandfathers Caring for Orphaned Grandchildren in Rural Malawi

ABSTRACT

Millions of orphans, created by parental deaths due to the HIV/AIDS pandemic in sub-Saharan Africa, live with, and are cared for, by grandparents. Little research has considered how grandparents and, in particular, grandfathers, are caring for orphans. Here, we employ the analytical concept of generative grandfathering to analyse rural grandfathers’ roles in orphan care within communities of Zomba District, Southern Malawi. Using an ethnographic approach to investigate orphan care, we engaged children, young people and adults in multiple qualitative research activities, including interviews, focus group discussions, stakeholder and dissemination meetings. The findings suggest that although grandfathers’ contributions to orphan care are on the periphery of research and policy concerned with grandparenting in Malawi and other regions of sub-Saharan Africa, grandfathers are incontrovertibly at the epicentre of their orphaned grandchildren’s everyday lives. Grandfathers are providers for their orphaned grandchildren, they support their formal education, and are integral to the intergenerational transmission of both knowledge and values. However, despite performing myriad caring roles in plain sight of their communities, grandfathers remain largely invisible due to gendered (mis)conceptions of care. This highlights the dilemma of grandfathers as ageing men who find themselves in roles not traditionally associated with hegemonic notions of masculinity in their communities.

KEYWORDS:

• care
• ethnographic research
• gender
• generative grandfathering
• grandfathers
• HIV/AIDS
• orphans
• poverty
• sub-Saharan Africa
• rural Malawi

Disclosure statement

The study was reviewed and given ethical approval by the Geography, Environment and Earth Science (GEES) Research Ethics committee University of Hull, UK at its meeting on 30 October 2015 (no approval number given) and by the National Commission of Science and Technology, National Committee on Research in the Social Sciences and Humanities in Malawi (approval no. P.10/15/62). Permission to recruit participants for the study was obtained from the local authorities in Malawi. Entry into the research site was facilitated by a small international non-governmental organisation through an internship undertaken by the first author. Informed consent was obtained from all adult research participants voluntarily and recorded by written signature. Parents/guardians provided written consent for children under 18 to participate and children’s assent was also obtained in writing. Written consent for publication was given by participants for all drawings included in this article.

This research was funded by a University of Hull PhD Studentship, with additional financial support from the University of Malawi, and the Sir Philip Reckitt Educational Trust.

All authors were involved in the research conception, study design, and analysis of the data. Fieldwork, primary data collection and data coding was conducted by the first author. All authors contributed to drafting and revision of the article, have approved the final version, agree to its submission and publication.

No conflict of interest was declared by the authors.

Notes

1 Participants’ names given here are pseudonyms.

2 Malaria is the leading cause of child mortality in Malawi (NSO & ICF International 2017) and the leading cause of morbidities in Zomba District, accounting for two-thirds (66.8 per cent) of child and adult mortality (Zomba District Assembly 2009).

3 Yao is a major ethnic group in Malawi and predominant in the research locale.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mayeso Chinseu Lazaro

Dr Mayeso Lazaro is a lecturer in Family Studies in the Human Ecology Department at the University of Malawi. He completed a PhD at the University of Hull, UK, after gaining a Master of Science in Family Ecology and Practice from the University of Alberta, Canada and a Bachelor of Education from the University of Malawi. He has research interests in families, children and young people, the elderly, aspects of rural and community development, as well as ethics and qualitative research methods. He is an experienced consultant who has worked with many international non-governmental organisations including ActionAid, GIZ, Save the Children, UNICEF, and World Vision. Mayeso Lazaro has recently contributed to an edited volume, Rural Gerontology: Towards Critical Perspectives on Rural Ageing (2021).

Liz Walker

Professor Liz Walker is a professor of health and social work research at the University of Hull. Professor Walker has an international research profile within the field of the sociology of health and gender and its applicability to social work. Her expertise in the area of HIV/AIDS in Southern Africa has been influential in the areas of social inequality and stigma. Her recent work focuses on the sociology of with chronic illness, specifically auto-immune conditions. At the University of Hull, Professor Walker is academic lead of the Institute for Clinical and Applied Health Research and lead researcher for the Social and Psychological Aspects of Research into Long-Term Health Conditions Group. She is associate director of the Wolfson Palliative Care Research Centre and chair of the Faculty of Health Sciences Ethics Committee.

Elsbeth Robson

Dr Elsbeth Robson is a reader in human geography at the University of Hull. Dr Robson is a human and development geographer with research and teaching interests in social inequality, ethics and social justice, particularly with respect to women and children/youth. Her research embraces qualitative, participatory and quantitative research methods. Geographically her research concentrates on sub-Saharan Africa. In the UK Dr Robson has been employed by/affiliated with the Universities of Keele, Durham, Liverpool and Brunel and in Africa the University of Malawi and Ahmadu Bello University, Nigeria. She has been a visiting scholar at the University of Zimbabwe, Gothenburg University (Sweden), University of Oulu (Finland) and Leiden University (Netherlands). She was the founding chair of the Save the Children UK Research and Evaluation Ethics Committee, a co-editor for Children’s Geographies journal and recently served on the Council of the African Studies Association UK.