| dc.description.abstract | After many years of experience from the field of preschool education and of being
concerned with several issues related to children and families, we've come across
many questions related to the term care. And, in particular, we've developed a
curiosity as to what is meant by “sufficient care.” We've both wondered about all the
different stories about care that we've encountered through our work. Parents told us
stories about caring – children relayed stories about caring, colleagues and
collaborators had many stories, all about caring, but often times very different. This
intrigued us and we felt the need to “dig deeper,” “look into,” and “shed light on”. In
our work, we've been inspired by poststructural theories, but we've chosen to use
theories of varying foundations and perspectives.
We felt we wanted to grab hold of some of the different stories that coexist with
people where we live our lives. What dictates the stories about care that we carry with
us, which are allowed to remain, and which are the ones that disappear? Some of the
stories that we felt were given quite a bit of space were about care in connection to
women. Care is often referred to as a “natural way” of being with children; “a
natural way” that women are being with children (Ulla, 2007:4). Although many
people recognize these stories that concern women and “the natural way of caring”, we
believe that it's only one of many stories, and this is the basis for our research. To
reach some of the stories about care, we had to have them told to us. We wanted to
open up to as many impressions and expressions as possible, and therefore chose to let
our work be inspired by the world of theater. We chose to call the participants in our
group actors, our actions are called scenes or productions, and we've also used the
concept of Theater sports when we've directed the scenes. As research workers we've
taken on roles as both actors and directors, to a certain extent. We've experienced this
as both opening and freeing for us in our research about care.
We wanted the stories about care to direct and focus our work, and we've tried to
remain as true as possible to the stories that were told. We tried to reach the stories
about care through an approach using café dialogue. We believe the more correct
terminology for this is a working tool, rather than a method. We invited five actors
who participated in four different productions. The productions touched on different
themes, but all the productions created texts or served as the basis for texts which all
were concerned with observations about care. The different stories about care that
have been told through dialogues in the scenes or as texts, has guided us in our choice
of theory and subjects of immersion. Our focus has, to a great extent, been on the productions and the stories about care that have emerged, and the focus on theory,
therefore, has not been given as much room. It has also been important for us in this
work to approach the stories about care from an empirical, as opposed to theoretical,
view. We've then elected to do critical readings and have been inspired by
deconstruction in working with the texts after the scenes.
Through this work, we've encountered even more observations concerning care, some
of them recognizable, others completely new to us. We know that there still are, and
always will be, stories and observations about care that see the light of day, and stories
that experience never being told. In our work, we've tried to relay some, and we hope
that our research can inspire others to tell their stories about care, so that as many care
stories as possible can take their place and stay with us. | en_US |
