Childhood(s) through time: an intergenerational lens on flexible narratives of childhood in Irish coastal communities

This paper explores extensive shifts in the (re)construction of childhood narratives in two small coastal communities in Ireland, through everyday rituals and practices which constitute meaning in a specific time and place. Although the specific time capsule of interest is childhood, this stage within the life course is explored from a relational intra/intergenerational perspective, over three generations of grandparents, parents, children and young people. The use of life biographies and ethnographic methods have provided rich insights into these shifting narratives, as those transitioning to youth and adult years are practicing ‘new’ negotiations played out amid broader structural changes in socio-economic, political and environmental spheres, within post-industrial Ireland. The power of place, of family and kinship structures, remain imperative for our participants, despite these extensive changes. This perspective considers the nuanced and fluctuant interplay of both structure and agency in terms of mediating intergenerational interdependencies across the life course, within increasingly individualised contexts.