Tatek Abebe
Tatek Abebe
Professor in Childhood Studies
Department of Education and Lifelong Learning Faculty of Social and Educational SciencesBackground and activities
I am convenor of postgraduate programs, namely MPhil in Childhood Studies and Ph.D. in Education specializing in Interdisciplinary Child Research. My teaching, research, and publications intersect childhood/youth studies and development studies with an emphasis on how young people are affected by and contribute to the transformation of the socio-cultural and political-economic environments they inhabit. I have conducted longitudinal ethnographic and participatory research on precarious childhoods and youth in Ethiopia and worked on a range of topics in diverse African contexts.
In recent years, my research has focused on popular culture and aesthetics of youth activism with an emphasis on the revolutionary capacities of young people's music/music videos/oral poetry. This includes fieldwork involving music activists, artists, lyricists, performers, etc. to bridge gaps in knowledge production between academia and other communities of practice on pressing concerns such as oppression, violence and dispossession, but also as a means to achieve cultural and epistemic justice.
Currently, I lead a project financed by the Norwegian Directorate for Higher Education and Skills (2019-2024) to facilitate research, teaching, and capacity-building activities on the connections between childhood, culture, and sustainable development. I am also involved in several writing projects, coediting the Routledge Handbook of Childhood and Global Development and a themed issue of Childhood on southern theories and global childhood studies.
I am a member of the research group on Critical Childhood and Youth Studies and serve as an editorial board member of Childhood; Children’s Geographies; and Fennia: International Journal of Geography.
Previous externally funded projects:
- Principal Investigator for research on the livelihood strategies of AIDS-affected children and families (Research Council of Norway, 2004-2008).
- Project Leader, Nordic Network of African Childhoods and Youth Research - NoNACYR (NordForsk, 2011-2016).
- Project Leader, Children’s Migration in Historical and Cross-cultural Perspectives (NOS-HS, 2017-2020).
- Co-Principal Investigator in interdisciplinary research consortium focusing on childhood and local knowledge in Ethiopia and Zambia (NUFU, 2007-2012).
- Co-Principal Investigator, Young People, Participation and Sustainable Development in an Urbanizing World (UN-Habitat, 2012-2013).
- Director of the Council for Development of Social Science Research in Africa’s Child and Youth Institute: African Futures and Childhood Studies in Africa (CODESRIA, 2017).
Courses
- BARN8201 - Methods and Ethics in Childhood Studies
- BARN3300 - Children and Development in the Global South
- BARN8101 - Social Studies of Children and Childhood: Research Perspectives
- BARN8200 - Methodology in Child and Childhood Research
- BARN3201 - Participatory Methods and Ethics
Scientific, academic and artistic work
Displaying a selection of activities. See all publications in the database
Journal publications
- (2021) Storytelling through Popular Music: Social Memory, Reconciliation, and Intergenerational Healing in Oromia/Ethiopia. Humanities. vol. 10 (2).
- (2021) Rights 'in' Education: Outlines for a Decolonial, Childist Reimagination of the Future – Commentary to Ansell and Colleagues. Fennia. vol. 199 (1).
- (2020) Lost Futures? Educated Youth Precarity and Protests in the Oromia Region, Ethiopia. Children's Geographies. vol. 18 (6).
- (2020) Children's experiences with Child Protection Services: A synthesis of qualitative evidence. Children and Youth Services Review. vol. 113.
- (2019) Reconceptualising Children's Agency as Continuum and Interdependence. SI on Childhood and Society. Social Sciences. vol. 8 (3).
- (2018) 'Global/Local' Research on Children and Childhood in a 'Global' Society. Childhood. vol. 25 (3).
- (2018) Tensions and controversies regarding child labor in small-scale gold mining in Ghana. African Geographical Review.
- (2016) Beyond pluralizing African childhoods: Introduction. Childhood. vol. 23 (3).
- (2016) Qenja: child fostering and relocation practices in Amhara region, Ethiopia. Children's Geographies. vol. 14 (1).
- (2016) Suffering and thriving: Children’s perspectives and interpretations of poverty and well-being in rural Zambia. Childhood. vol. 23 (3).
- (2014) Advancing ethical research with children: Critical reflections on ethical guidelines. Children's Geographies. vol. 12 (1).
- (2012) AIDS-affected children, family collectives and the social dynamics of care in Ethiopia. Geoforum. vol. 43 (3).
- (2012) Reflexivity and dialogue: methodological and socio-ethical dilemmas in research with HIV-affected children in East Africa. Ethics, Policy & Environment. vol. 15 (1).
- (2011) Dominant Discourses, Debates and Silences on Child Labour in Africa and Asia. Third World Quarterly. vol. 32 (4).
- (2010) Beyond the ‘orphan burden’: understanding care for and by AIDS-affected children in Africa. Geography Compass.
- (2010) Livelihoods, care and the familial relations of orphans in Eastern Afr. AIDS Care. vol. 22 (5).
- (2009) Begging as a livelihood pathway of street children in Addis Ababa. Forum for Development Studies. vol. 36 (2).
- (2009) Child labour in the global South: A review and critical commentary. Barn. vol. 27 (3 - 4).
- (2009) Multiple methods, complex dilemmas: negotiating socio-ethical spaces in participatory research with disadvantaged children. Children's Geographies. vol. 7 (4).
- (2009) Orphanhood, Poverty and the Care Dilemma: Review of Global Policy Trends. Social Work & Society. vol. 7 (1).
- (2009) Social Actors and Victims of Exploitation. Working children in the cash economy of Ethiopia's South. Childhood. vol. 16 (2).
- (2008) Earning a living on the margins: Begging, street work and the socio-spatial experiences of children in Addis Ababa. Geografiska Annaler: Series B, Human Geography. vol. 90 (3).
- (2008) The Ethiopian "Family Collective" and Child Agency. Barn.
- (2008) Trapped between disparate worlds: the livelihoods, socialisation and schooling contexts of children in rural Ethiopia. Childhoods Today. vol. 2 (1).
- (2007) Changing Livelihoods, Changing Childhoods: Patterns of Children's Work in Rural Southern Ethiopia. Children's Geographies. vol. 5 (1-2).
- (2007) Children, AIDS and the politics of orphan care in Ethiopia: The extended family revisited. Social Science and Medicine. vol. 64 (10).
- (2005) Geographical dimensions of AIDS orphanhood in sub-Saharan Africa. Norsk Geografisk Tidsskrift.
Books
- (2021) Barndomsstudier i norsk kontekst : Tverrfaglige tilnærminger. Gyldendal Akademisk. 2021. ISBN 9788205519213.
- (2017) Laboring and Learning. Springer. 2017. ISBN 978-981-287-031-5. Geographies of Children and Young People (.).
- (2013) Childhood and Local Knowledge in Ethiopia: Livelihoods, Rights and Intergenerational Relationships. Akademika forlag. 2013. ISBN 9788251928533.
Part of book/report
- (2021) Rekonseptualisering av "Aktorskap" i Barndomsstudier. Barndomsstudier i norsk kontekst : Tverrfaglige tilnærminger.
- (2021) Barndomsstudier i Norge: Historien, konteksten og hvor vi er i dag. Barndomsstudier i norsk kontekst : Tverrfaglige tilnærminger.
- (2021) Tverrfaglige barndomsstudier: Hvor er vi, og hvor går vi?. Barndomsstudier i norsk kontekst : Tverrfaglige tilnærminger.
- (2020) AIDS Orphans. The Sage Encyclopedia of Children and Childhood Studies.
- (2020) ETHIOPIA. Teens Lives Around the World: A Global Encyclopedia.
- (2017) Geographies of Laboring and Learning: Introduction. Laboring and Learning..
- (2017) Young People’s Marginal Livelihoods and Social Transitions in Urban Brazil: Tale of Four Lives. Laboring and Learning..
- (2016) Political economy of children’s work: economic restructuring, the coffee trade and social reproduction in post-Socialist Ethiopia. Geographies of Global Issues: Change and Threat.
- (2015) Reframing children's contributions to household livelihoods in Ethiopia through a political-economy perspective. Children's Work and Labour in East Africa. Social Context and Implications for Policy.
- (2014) Earning Rights - Discourses on Childrens Rights and Proper Childhood in Ethiopia. Childrens Lives in an Era of Childrens Rights The Progress of the Convention on the Rights of the Child in Africa.
- (2013) Interdependent Rights and Agency: Children's Role in Collective Livelihood Strategies in Rural Ethiopia. Reconceptualizing Children's Rights in International Development: Living Rights, Social Justice and Translations.
- (2013) Migrant children’s portfolio of street-based livelihoods in urban Ethiopia. Childhood and Local Knowledge in Ethiopia: Livelihoods, Rights and Intergenerational Relationships.
- (2013) Children, Intergenerational Relationships and Local Knowledge in Ethiopia. Childhood and Local Knowledge in Ethiopia: Livelihoods, Rights and Intergenerational Relationships.
- (2013) Children’s Knowledge of Local Food Sources and Habits in Southwestern Ethiopia. Childhood and Local Knowledge in Ethiopia: Livelihoods, Rights and Intergenerational Relationships.
- (2013) The Socio-economic Roles of Children in Ethiopian Periodic Markets. Childhood and Local Knowledge in Ethiopia: Livelihoods, Rights and Intergenerational Relationships.
- (2013) Childhood and Parenting Practices in Dilla Town. Childhood and Local Knowledge in Ethiopia: Livelihoods, Rights and Intergenerational Relationships.
- (2012) Orphanhood, Poverty and the Channenges of Care - Review of Global Policy Trends. Orphan Care: A Comparative View.
- (2011) Gendered work and schooling in rural Ethiopia: Exploring working children's perspectives. Not Just a Victim: The Child as Catalyst and Witness of Contemporary Africa.
- (2010) Sik'älla as a Way of Life: Begging, Poverty and the Livelihood Paths of Child Beggars in Addis Ababa. Research in Ethiopian Studies: Selected papers of the 16th International Conference of Ethiopian Studies, Trondheim July 2007, Aethiopistische Forschungen Vol. 72.
- (2008) Changing Livelihoods, Changing Childhoods: Patterns of Children's Work in Rural Southern Ethiopia. Global Childhoods: Globalization, Development and Young People.
Report/dissertation
- (2011) Young people, participation, and sustainable development in an urbanizing world. 2011.
- (2008) Ethiopian Childhoods: A Case Study of the Lives of Orphans and Working Children. 2008. ISBN 978-82-471-6731-1.