Grandparenting as the resolution of kinship as experience

Dados Bibliográficos

ID2254166
AutoresDaniel Miller (0000-0001-6554-9174, University College London, autor correspondente), P Garvey (0000-0002-7570-8965, National University of Ireland, Maynooth, autor correspondente)
Ano2022
Volume28
Fascículo3
Páginas975-992
Data de publicação2022-09-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoJournal of the Royal Anthropological Institute (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 1359-0987 • E-ISSN: 1467-9655
EditoraWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/1467-9655.13779
PMID36249473
OpenAlexW4283269778
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas5
Referências citadas37

This article argues that a population of relatively affluent retired people in a small Irish town have employed the possibilities of grandparenting to resolve many of the tensions of contemporary kinship. This includes the tension between the obligations of prescriptive relationships as against the voluntarism of friendship. This is considered against a background shift in kinship studies towards a distinction between kinship as a category and kinship as experience. Kinship as experience often now comprises a series of deep fluctuations during the life course. Experience is also extended by the growth in life expectancy. This makes it still more important that the legacy of an individual's prior experiences of kinship may be partially resolved through the experience of grandparenting. The profound consequences of grandparenting lie not in the relationship to the grandchildren but in the possibilities that grandparenting offers to recalibrate all other kinship relations. These include the relationship with one's own children, the relationship with partners, the legacy of one's prior experience of being a parent, and even the memory of the way one was parented when a child

Developmental psychology · Fictive kinship · Friendship · Genealogy · Grandparent · Kinship · Kinship care · Population · Sociology · Aging, Elder Care, and Social Issues · Anthropology · Demography · History · Intergenerational Family Dynamics and Caregiving · Migration, Aging, and Tourism Studies · Psychology · Social Psychology