Facing the void: Recollections of embodying fear in the space of childhood homes

Abstract

Homes occupy a complex and contradictory space in our lived, symbolic and imaginary geographies. Often idealised as a sanctuary, homes are also places of conflict, tension and danger. The research presented in this paper used a Memory Work Group method to explore women's recollections of embodying fear as children, in the context of their childhood homes. Our analysis suggests that experiences of fear were remembered in terms of a sense of separation, or being in a relational void. This void can be described as a felt and sensed relational space, characterised by a lack of communication and sense of nothingness. As such, others were present, but the child experienced not being seen/not seeing others, simultaneously being there with the other, but also experiencing not existing to the other. We suggest here that remembered experiences of fear were lived through materially, and in process with objects and spaces not as passive backdrops, but as giving opportunity to and participating in meaning making and the management of the embodiment of fear, and felt sense of relational void. These findings are discussed in relation to the role of children's imagination in navigating the disparity between child and adult experiences of the world, as well as the potential role of memory as a route to bridging the gap between child and adult understandings and experiences of embodying emotion.

Women’s embodied experiences of using wearable digital self-tracking health technology: A review of the qualitative research literature

“…In contrast to generating information through an interview where the participants answers the researcher's questions one after the other, methods that can be considered more experiential or creative can allow participants to actively engage in producing their data. Visual methods, memory work group methods, diary-writing methods and drawing methods, for instance, are data collection strategies that often generate detailed and rich narrative accounts that are grounded in specific and concrete lived experiences (Del Busso, 2020;Del Busso et al, 2018;Elliot, 1997;Gillies et al, 2005Gillies et al, , 2004Jacelon & Imperio, 2005;Maratos et al, 2016). Firstly, diary writing allows participants to write detailed accounts close to the time of having lived through experiences relevant to the topic of research (e.g.…”

“…The participants then write a detailed yet short account of one specific remembered experience in the third person, avoiding interpretation and including as much concrete detail as possible. In the next stage of the research, the memories are read and analyzed collectively by the group over the course of a number of sessions, with the aim of identifying and understanding the content of experience in relation to the topic of research (Gillies et al, 2004;Del Busso et al, 2018). In this context the participant are thus simultaneously participants and researchers, setting the research agenda, deciding the trigger and analyzing their own experiences (e.g.…”