Jan Flaherty
Biographic Data
| ID | 4249845 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Jan Flaherty |
| GIVEN NAMES | Jan |
| FAMILY NAME | Flaherty |
| SIGNATURE | FLAHERTY J |
| AFFILIATIONS | Nottingham Trent University |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-0959-9518 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 9 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 31 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 9 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2012 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Renaming in Adoption: Exploring Name Ambivalence in Adoptive Parents' Name Stories
Names are central to identity, yet their role in adoption, where identity and family dynamics are complex, remains under‐researched. This article draws on findings from a qualitative study of names and adoption in England and Wales to examine adoptive parents' decisions about the first names of their children. Despite policy, which advocates the retention of a child's birth name, we found that half of the adopter participants' children had had th…
I was once another person with a different name: Adult adoptees’ experiences of first name changes
This article draws on findings from a study of names and adoption to discuss first name changes from the perspective of adult adoptees. We discuss how birth first names can be seen as a lost identity or ‘a life not lived’ by adoptees and how the separation between ‘birth’ and ‘adoptive’ first names can lead to confusion, with some adoptees asking, ‘Who actually am I?’ We outline how adoptees attempt to bring into their lives their birth and adopt…
The research politics of (re)naming participants: A sociology of names perspective
In this article we argue that theoretical and empirical insights from the sociology of people's names can enrich qualitative researchers' decision-making about, and descriptions of, their practices of (re)naming participants as well as inform methodological debates about these practices. We review the research politics of participants' names and outline how issues of anonymisation and pseudonymisation can be thought through using sociological the…
Surnames in Adoption: (Re)creating Identities of Belonging
Names are increasingly recognised in sociology as important routes for understanding family relationships, as well as familial and individual identities. In this article, we use qualitative ‘name story’ data to examine the meanings of surnames for adults who were adopted as a child and for adults who have adopted a child. Our findings suggest that adult adoptees and adopters can feel differently about surnames and how these connect them—or otherw…
Life history mapping: Exploring journeys into and through housing and homelessness
This article illustrates the value of in-depth life history interviews using life mapping in qualitative research. We draw on our recent research into people's experiences of homelessness, where all 39 participants were currently, or recently, homeless. Using the life mapping method, participants generated a visual representation of their transitions across housing and homelessness, beginning in childhood and ending in the present day. We critica…
There’s nothing I can do to stop it’: Homelessness among autistic people in a British city
Autistic people appear to have a higher risk of becoming and remaining homeless than people without autism. This article is based on a wider research study exploring diverse homelessness experiences in Oxford, UK. Using life mapping, a visual research method, we gained verbal and visual accounts of participants’ housing and homeless histories. These accounts support past evidence of higher than expected levels of autism among homeless people, whi…
Living through continuous displacement: Resisting homeless identities and remaking precarious lives
This article considers how individuals who experience continuous displacement from housing manage the ‘spoiled identity’ of homelessness. The research draws on in-depth, biographical interviews with 39 individuals living in Oxford, a high-cost UK city. All had experienced forms of homelessness in the previous three years. Building on critical debates around experiences of precarity in urban geography, the article explores how individuals construc…
In whose interest? The dynamics of debt in poor households
This article examines the dynamics of credit and debt in low income households, drawing on an action research project with 24 households in the Teesside area of North East England. Despite crippling interest rates, high-cost credit sources (for example, doorstep lending, catalogue, rent-to-own and payday loan companies) are increasingly used by households that are excluded from mainstream financial services. The article discusses the range of cre…
The ‘sluice-gate’ public sphere and the national DNA database in the UK
Habermas’s amendments to his original public sphere thesis have been recognized by a number of media scholars in recent years. His original thesis of a decline or re-feudalization of the public sphere where politics is played out in front of the public has been modified, under the influence of Bernhard Peters’ work, to incorporate the possibility of action from the periphery of the public sphere influencing, if not exclusively determining, decisi…
Living through continuous displacement: Resisting homeless identities and remaking precarious lives
This article considers how individuals who experience continuous displacement from housing manage the ‘spoiled identity’ of homelessness. The research draws on in-depth, biographical interviews with 39 individuals living in Oxford, a high-cost UK city. All had experienced forms of homelessness in the previous three years. Building on critical debates around experiences of precarity in urban geography, the article explores how individuals construc…
Life history mapping: Exploring journeys into and through housing and homelessness
This article illustrates the value of in-depth life history interviews using life mapping in qualitative research. We draw on our recent research into people's experiences of homelessness, where all 39 participants were currently, or recently, homeless. Using the life mapping method, participants generated a visual representation of their transitions across housing and homelessness, beginning in childhood and ending in the present day. We critica…
There’s nothing I can do to stop it’: Homelessness among autistic people in a British city
Autistic people appear to have a higher risk of becoming and remaining homeless than people without autism. This article is based on a wider research study exploring diverse homelessness experiences in Oxford, UK. Using life mapping, a visual research method, we gained verbal and visual accounts of participants’ housing and homeless histories. These accounts support past evidence of higher than expected levels of autism among homeless people, whi…
In whose interest? The dynamics of debt in poor households
This article examines the dynamics of credit and debt in low income households, drawing on an action research project with 24 households in the Teesside area of North East England. Despite crippling interest rates, high-cost credit sources (for example, doorstep lending, catalogue, rent-to-own and payday loan companies) are increasingly used by households that are excluded from mainstream financial services. The article discusses the range of cre…
Surnames in Adoption: (Re)creating Identities of Belonging
Names are increasingly recognised in sociology as important routes for understanding family relationships, as well as familial and individual identities. In this article, we use qualitative ‘name story’ data to examine the meanings of surnames for adults who were adopted as a child and for adults who have adopted a child. Our findings suggest that adult adoptees and adopters can feel differently about surnames and how these connect them—or otherw…
The ‘sluice-gate’ public sphere and the national DNA database in the UK
Habermas’s amendments to his original public sphere thesis have been recognized by a number of media scholars in recent years. His original thesis of a decline or re-feudalization of the public sphere where politics is played out in front of the public has been modified, under the influence of Bernhard Peters’ work, to incorporate the possibility of action from the periphery of the public sphere influencing, if not exclusively determining, decisi…
The ‘sluice-gate’ public sphere and the national DNA database in the UK
Habermas’s amendments to his original public sphere thesis have been recognized by a number of media scholars in recent years. His original thesis of a decline or re-feudalization of the public sphere where politics is played out in front of the public has been modified, under the influence of Bernhard Peters’ work, to incorporate the possibility of action from the periphery of the public sphere influencing, if not exclusively determining, decisi…
In whose interest? The dynamics of debt in poor households
This article examines the dynamics of credit and debt in low income households, drawing on an action research project with 24 households in the Teesside area of North East England. Despite crippling interest rates, high-cost credit sources (for example, doorstep lending, catalogue, rent-to-own and payday loan companies) are increasingly used by households that are excluded from mainstream financial services. The article discusses the range of cre…
Living through continuous displacement: Resisting homeless identities and remaking precarious lives
This article considers how individuals who experience continuous displacement from housing manage the ‘spoiled identity’ of homelessness. The research draws on in-depth, biographical interviews with 39 individuals living in Oxford, a high-cost UK city. All had experienced forms of homelessness in the previous three years. Building on critical debates around experiences of precarity in urban geography, the article explores how individuals construc…
There’s nothing I can do to stop it’: Homelessness among autistic people in a British city
Autistic people appear to have a higher risk of becoming and remaining homeless than people without autism. This article is based on a wider research study exploring diverse homelessness experiences in Oxford, UK. Using life mapping, a visual research method, we gained verbal and visual accounts of participants’ housing and homeless histories. These accounts support past evidence of higher than expected levels of autism among homeless people, whi…
Surnames in Adoption: (Re)creating Identities of Belonging
Names are increasingly recognised in sociology as important routes for understanding family relationships, as well as familial and individual identities. In this article, we use qualitative ‘name story’ data to examine the meanings of surnames for adults who were adopted as a child and for adults who have adopted a child. Our findings suggest that adult adoptees and adopters can feel differently about surnames and how these connect them—or otherw…
Life history mapping: Exploring journeys into and through housing and homelessness
This article illustrates the value of in-depth life history interviews using life mapping in qualitative research. We draw on our recent research into people's experiences of homelessness, where all 39 participants were currently, or recently, homeless. Using the life mapping method, participants generated a visual representation of their transitions across housing and homelessness, beginning in childhood and ending in the present day. We critica…
Renaming in Adoption: Exploring Name Ambivalence in Adoptive Parents' Name Stories
Names are central to identity, yet their role in adoption, where identity and family dynamics are complex, remains under‐researched. This article draws on findings from a qualitative study of names and adoption in England and Wales to examine adoptive parents' decisions about the first names of their children. Despite policy, which advocates the retention of a child's birth name, we found that half of the adopter participants' children had had th…
I was once another person with a different name: Adult adoptees’ experiences of first name changes
This article draws on findings from a study of names and adoption to discuss first name changes from the perspective of adult adoptees. We discuss how birth first names can be seen as a lost identity or ‘a life not lived’ by adoptees and how the separation between ‘birth’ and ‘adoptive’ first names can lead to confusion, with some adoptees asking, ‘Who actually am I?’ We outline how adoptees attempt to bring into their lives their birth and adopt…
The research politics of (re)naming participants: A sociology of names perspective
In this article we argue that theoretical and empirical insights from the sociology of people's names can enrich qualitative researchers' decision-making about, and descriptions of, their practices of (re)naming participants as well as inform methodological debates about these practices. We review the research politics of participants' names and outline how issues of anonymisation and pseudonymisation can be thought through using sociological the…
Sociology (6 works) · Political science (5 works) · Psychology (4 works) · Aesthetics (3 works) · Child Welfare and Adoption (3 works) · Homelessness and Social Issues (3 works) · Identity (music (3 works) · Names, Identity, and Discrimination Research (3 works) · Anthropology (2 works) · Developmental psychology (2 works)