Inside teenage bedrooms A cross-generational study of the teenage bedroom and its material culture
Abstract
It has been suggested (Zeiher & Zeiher, 1991; Gillis, 2008) that contemporary
Western childhood has become increasingly ‘islanded’ – lived out in the specialized
spaces dedicated to children that are conceived both for the safe containment of
the young and the protection of an adult ideal of what childhood should be. What
then should we make of the contemporary teenage bedroom – a space dedicated
to the transition between childhood and adulthood within the family home? Whose
construction is it? Does it, similarly, support an adult ideal of teenage life? How
does it relate, conceptually and in practice, to the home that surrounds it? What
negotiations take place around it? And in what way does it facilitate navigation
from the islands of childhood to the mainland of adulthood?
This research explores the meaning and significance of the teenage bedroom in the
context of the wider home. A cross-generational, qualitative study, it comprised
interviews with 26 teenagers and their parents, living in East and North London. A
‘library’ of photographic images compiled for each room – in collaboration with the
Geffrye Museum of the Home – formed the initial basis of conversations with
teenagers, inspiring a close engagement with the room’s material culture and its
day-to-day practices. In the recollections of parents, the bedrooms they had
occupied themselves as teenagers, between the late 1970s and the early 1990s,
flickered into view, facilitating reflection on similarities and differences between
the home-lives of their own teenage children and themselves, and bringing an
extended temporal dimension to the research. Both the teenagers and their
parents explored family negotiations around the room and its construction.
Drawing on their accounts and insights, the study considers what these teenage
rooms tell us about home, family and teenage life.
Authors
Newson, CareyCollections
- Theses [4222]