Gendered childhoods and the inequity of accessing the outdoors

Abstract

Understanding our beliefs and experiences means we must often explore our childhood experiences, and reflect on how, at certain points in our life, a range of barriers, obstacles, and societal or social constructs have resulted in shaping the opportunities we had and our behaviours in accessing them. Herein we consider and reflect on the paper ‘“Muddy Glee”: rounding out the picture of women and physical geography fieldwork’ and take inspiration to reframe and discuss a broader context of childhood experiences in setting the background for the observations made within the paper. We highlight and discuss three key provocations, which provide a framework to explore how social constructions of gender, from within the womb onwards, impact women's experiences, challenges, and pleasures of fieldwork in geography, and moreover link these experiences to the restrictions on access to the outdoors women experience in everyday life.

Classics Revisited: ‘Muddy glee’ ‐ What geography fieldwork means in the current moment

“…This Classics Revisited collection was borne from the various authors contributing to a thought‐provoking workshop organised by the RGS‐IBG and Area editorial team. Herein, we have contributions reflecting on ‘Muddy glee’ from a broad range of intersectional perspectives, ranging from ‘women in tropical peatlands’ (Thornton et al, 2022), disabilities (Bhakta, 2022; Rose, 2022), those with intersectional identities (Lawrence, 2022), LGBTQ+ (Mackay & Bishop, 2022; Zebracki & Greatrick, 2022), race‐related (Hughes, 2022), mental health (Tucker et al, 2022), those with childcare responsibilities (Bastia et al, 2022) and gendered access to the field for children (Parsons & Halstead, 2022). Each contributor has reflected on ‘Muddy glee’ from their own perspective, some engaging deeply with the original piece, others using it only as a springboard for broadening the debate.…”