Charting new territories: re-assembling childhood sexuality in the early years classroom

Abstract

Since the moral panic discourse is shutting down discussions about how children are making meaning of gender and sexuality, this paper argues that a new logic is needed for understanding childhood sexuality. A postdevelopmental logic is created by working with Deleuze and Guattari's [Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism and Schizoprhenia. Translated by Robert Hurley, Mark Seem and Helen R. Lane. London: Athlone and A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia. Translated by Brian Massumi. London: Continuum. (Orig. pub. 1980)] concepts ‘assemblage’, ‘desire’, and ‘territories’ to understand childhood sexuality in ways that do not rely on the notion of a ‘moral panic’. By re-assembling data generated from an exploratory study of talk by young children about gender and sexuality this paper creates new connections about childhood, gender, and sexualities. It does this by moving away from developmental framings, initiating a different dialogue about curiosities, human and nonhuman bodies, and desires, to chart new territories about childhood sexuality in the early years classroom.

Acknowledgements

The project was funded by The Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality and was approved by both the childcare centre's management committee and the university ethics committee.

Notes

1. A Senate inquiry is a federal level, high-profile public investigation conducted by the elected members of a parliamentary committee. These committees accept public submissions, make responses, hold public hearings and publish reports. For more information about the membership and the completed report into the sexualisation of children in the contemporary media, see the Australian Senate Standing Committee on the Environment, Communication and the Arts, at www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate_Committees?url=ec_ctte/index.htm, accessed 9 November 2012.

2. Pseudonyms are used for all research participants throughout this paper.

3. Bratz dolls are an American line of dolls, dressed in a ‘fashionable’ teenager style. The American Psychological Association expressed concern about the sexualisation of the doll's clothing and its effects on children.

4. Although there are many different psychoanalytic understandings of desire, Deleuze and Guattari's main critique is of the work of Lacan and Freud. See Layton (2004) for an overview of the important contributions feminists have made in relational analytic theory and clinical work.

5. The children are excitedly talking at once and over each other. It is impossible to determine who is speaking, even after listening to the audio-recording many times. In this instance, an ellipsis is used to indicate when a new voice and statement are heard.

6. This term, ‘trashy’, is usually used to signal class contempt.

7. These terms, ‘cool’ and ‘sexy’ were used by children in their discussions about gender and sexuality.