Educational Exit and the Pursuit of a Happy Childhood Among Singaporean Middle-Class Families
(2024) In Global Networks- Abstract (Swedish)
- On the basis of ethnographic fieldwork in Singapore, the article explores the tension between children's academic success and emotional wellbeing, and the ways in which middle-class parents navigate these conflicting aspirations. It delves into families with young children who pursue alternative lifestyles by moving abroad to a presumably less stressful environment or by homeschooling their children. The study aims to understand how parents who ‘opt out’ perceive their children's future and the sacrifices they make in pursuing alternative education for their children. Decisions were made to ‘protect’ the child from the potentially negative effects of a competitive education system, while pursuing an alternative childhood and school–life... (More)
- On the basis of ethnographic fieldwork in Singapore, the article explores the tension between children's academic success and emotional wellbeing, and the ways in which middle-class parents navigate these conflicting aspirations. It delves into families with young children who pursue alternative lifestyles by moving abroad to a presumably less stressful environment or by homeschooling their children. The study aims to understand how parents who ‘opt out’ perceive their children's future and the sacrifices they make in pursuing alternative education for their children. Decisions were made to ‘protect’ the child from the potentially negative effects of a competitive education system, while pursuing an alternative childhood and school–life balance. East Asian education systems are globally renowned for their high academic standards and for producing students who score at the top on international assessment tests and rankings. In this context, alternative educational pursuits are both less established and less well understood, yet they are central to understanding emerging aspirations of wellbeing as well as the reconfiguration of conventional ideals of upward social mobility. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/db790752-a138-41e2-9db1-4173ced8ad5a
- author
- Göransson, Kristina LU
- organization
- publishing date
- 2024
- type
- Contribution to journal
- publication status
- epub
- subject
- keywords
- Parenting, Education, Childhood, Mobility, Homeschooling, Wellbeing, Lifestyle migration, Singapore
- in
- Global Networks
- article number
- e12498
- publisher
- Wiley-Blackwell
- external identifiers
-
- scopus:85201598256
- ISSN
- 1470-2266
- DOI
- 10.1111/glob.12498
- project
- Parenting strategies around children's education in urban China, South Korea and Singapore: A comparative ethnographic study
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- db790752-a138-41e2-9db1-4173ced8ad5a
- date added to LUP
- 2024-08-27 10:27:46
- date last changed
- 2024-08-28 04:00:46
@article{db790752-a138-41e2-9db1-4173ced8ad5a,
abstract = {{On the basis of ethnographic fieldwork in Singapore, the article explores the tension between children's academic success and emotional wellbeing, and the ways in which middle-class parents navigate these conflicting aspirations. It delves into families with young children who pursue alternative lifestyles by moving abroad to a presumably less stressful environment or by homeschooling their children. The study aims to understand how parents who ‘opt out’ perceive their children's future and the sacrifices they make in pursuing alternative education for their children. Decisions were made to ‘protect’ the child from the potentially negative effects of a competitive education system, while pursuing an alternative childhood and school–life balance. East Asian education systems are globally renowned for their high academic standards and for producing students who score at the top on international assessment tests and rankings. In this context, alternative educational pursuits are both less established and less well understood, yet they are central to understanding emerging aspirations of wellbeing as well as the reconfiguration of conventional ideals of upward social mobility.}},
author = {{Göransson, Kristina}},
issn = {{1470-2266}},
keywords = {{Parenting; Education; Childhood; Mobility; Homeschooling; Wellbeing; Lifestyle migration; Singapore}},
language = {{eng}},
publisher = {{Wiley-Blackwell}},
series = {{Global Networks}},
title = {{Educational Exit and the Pursuit of a Happy Childhood Among Singaporean Middle-Class Families}},
url = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/glob.12498}},
doi = {{10.1111/glob.12498}},
year = {{2024}},
}