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This paper is based on a critical analysis of a chain of retail outlets called 'Girl Heaven', aimed primarily at 3-13-year-old girls, described variously as 'a piece of retail folklore' (Lumsden, 1999) and as 'Guardian Wimmin Hell' (Kettle, 1999). It argues that while on the one hand Girl Heaven appears to provide a celebratory social space in which girls can affirm their femininity, it also seems to epitomize the commercial appropriation of childhood femininity. As a way into exploring these two alternatives, this article is concerned initially with what it means to 'do' feminine childhood against the backdrop of contemporary consumer culture. It then outlines the methodological approach that we take to researching Girt Heaven, and the ways in which we explore young girls' lived experience of consumer culture and gender acquisition. We then consider the commercial context of Girl Heaven in rotation to the increasing market recognition of 'tweenies', as well as the significance of pester power and branding in childhood approaches to consumption. We subsequently focus on Girl Heaven as a cultural text, concentrating on its construction of femininity. Our analysis culminates in an attempt to reflect critically on the complex relationship between consumer culture and the process of becoming a woman. We reflect on Girt Heaven -- with which, our research suggests, young girls themselves are acutely aware of having a relationship that is far from straightforward -- as a notable manifestation of this complexity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Visual methods such as photography are under-used in the active process of sociological research. As rare as visual methods are, it is even rarer for the resultant images to be made by rather than of research participants. Primarily, the paper explores the challenges and contradictions of using photography within a multi-method approach. We consider processes for analysing visual data, different ways of utilising visual methods in sociological research, and the use of primary and secondary data, or, simple illustration versus active visual exploration of the social. The question of triangulation of visual data against text and testimony versus a stand-alone approach is explored in depth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The past two decades have seen rapid changes in the ways in which sociologists think about children, and a growing cross-fertilisation of ideas between researchers in a variety of social science disciplines. This paper builds upon these developments by exploring what three inter-related ways of thinking about spatiality might contribute to the new social studies of childhood. Specifically, we identify the importance of progressive understandings of place in overcoming the split between global and local approaches to childhood; we discuss the ways in which children's identities are constituted in and through particular spaces; and we examine the ways in which our understandings of childhood can shape the meaning of spaces and places. These ideas are illustrated by reference to our current research on children's use of the internet as well as a range of wider studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we explore some key antionomies which have emerged in relation to children and childhood in late modernity: tensions between autonomy and protection and between perceptions of children as 'at risk' and as potentially threatening. A particular focus here is on the sexualisation of risk, the degree of public concern expressed whenever the sexual 'innocence' of children is thought to be endangered. We argue that the concept of risk anxiety provides a useful means of analysing contemporary fears about children and childhood and may thus be understood as contributing to the ongoing social construction of childhood. Here risk anxiety must be located within the context of gendered and generational power relations, in which children's lives are bounded by adult surveillance. Furthermore, risk anxiety may have material consequences for children's daily lives and for everyday adult-child negotiations around safety and danger, protection and autonomy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]