Parenting and Family Studies Alliance
Parenting and Family Studies Alliance
Background:
The Parenting and Family Studies Alliance was established in September 2015. It aims to promote and facilitate critical inquiry into the changing nature of parenting and family life in modern society.
The Parenting and Family Studies Alliance is co-ordinated by Dr. Ashling Jackson (Athlone Institute of Technology), Dr. Colm O’Doherty (Institute of Technology Tralee) and Dr. Noel Richardson, (Institute of Technology Carlow).
About us (Bios and Photos):
Dr. Ashling Jackson is a Senior Lecturer in Social Care at Athlone Institute of Technology. She lectures in the areas of sociology/social policy, community development and research methods. Her PhD in Sociology investigated premarital cohabitation as a pathway into marriage and how premarital cohabitation is transforming the institution of marriage in Ireland. She is co-editor (with Dr. Colm O’Doherty) of Community Development in Ireland – Theory, Policy and Practice (2012) (Dublin: Gill and Macmillan) and Learning on the Job: Parenting in Modern Ireland (2015) (Cork: Oak Tress Press). She is also an editor of the Irish Journal of Applied Social Studies. Prior to joining Athlone Institute of Technology, Ashling was a Public Health Research Officer with the Health Service Executive – Dublin Mid Leinster region, where she was responsible for the qualitative research function of the Dept. of Public Health. Her primary research interests are in the areas of family, parenting, community, health and ethnicity.
Dr. Colm O’Doherty is a lecturer in Applied Social Studies at the Institute of Technology Tralee. He began his professional career as a Social Worker in Coventry and developed a family support service in the inner city there. After leaving Coventry Social Services he worked as a Social Worker in West Wales and Cork City and County where he continued his involvement in family support and community development practice. After eighteen years of front line practice in social work, family support and community development he took on a pivotal role in community and social work education at University College Cork. He left UCC and moved to the Institute of Technology Tralee. His PhD, completed in 2004, critically examined the national deployment of family support services. He is the author of A New Agenda for Family Support –Providing Services that Create Social Capital (2007) and co-editor (with Dr. Ashling Jackson) of Community Development in Ireland –Theory, Policy and Practice (2012) and Learning on the Job-Parenting in Modern Ireland (2015).
Dr Noel Richardson has extensive experience in the area of men’s health at a research, policy and advocacy level. He is co-author of Ireland’s National Policy on men’s health and has published a broad range of research reports and academic papers in the area of men’s health. He is director of the National Centre for Men’s Health at the Institute of Technology Carlow and is seconded on a half-time basis to the HSE with responsibility for men’s health. He is a board member of both the Men’s Health Forum in Ireland and the European Men’s Health Forum.
Activities:
A new focus on the ‘doing’ of family life and parenting reflects a movement in scholarship away from institutional or organisational features and towards family relationships and behaviours (O’Doherty and Jackson, 2015). The newer scholarship on family is animated especially by the richness of family life, the elective nature of much kinship activity, family as constituted by predispositions, needs and concerns that people bring to their interpersonal relations, the significance of individualisation, and how family ties are altered and recreated through discourses, relations and interactions (Daly and Kelly, 2015). To track and respond to this change, as it is occurring, the Parenting and Family Studies Alliance focuses on the following:
- Creating an accessible network of professionals (academia and practice);
- Facilitating opportunities for collaboration and/or research activities;
- Being a resource to lecturing staff.
References:
Daly, M. and Kelly, G. (2015). Families and Poverty: Everyday Life on a Low Income. Bristol: Policy Press.
O’ Doherty, C. and Jackson, A. (2015). Learning on the Job: Parenting in Modern Ireland. Cork: Oak Tree Press.
Links to social media:
Resources/links
Centre for Parenting Culture Studies (University of Kent, UK): https://www.kent.ac.uk/sspssr/research/centres/parenting-culture.html
Daly, M. and Kelly, G. (2015). Families and Poverty: Everyday Life on a Low Income. Bristol: Policy Press. http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/distributed/F/bo20229310.html
O’ Doherty, C. and Jackson, A. (2015). Learning on the Job: Parenting in Modern Ireland. Cork: Oak Tree Press. https://www.amazon.com/Learning-Job-Parenting-Modern-Ireland/dp/1781191875
The Parenting Research Centre (Melbourne, Australia): http://www.parentingrc.org.au/index.php
Contact details:
Dr. Ashling Jackson: ajackson@ait.ie
Dr. Colm O’ Doherty: Colm.ODoherty@staff.ittralee.ie
Dr. Noel Richardson: Noel.Richardson@itcarlow.ie
