Family, Generation and Change in the Context of Crisis

Dear Colleagues,

Genealogy is now accepting submissions on the theme “Family, Generation and Change in the Context of Crisis”. At the forefront of this Special Issue are questions related to family, generation and social change forged through and amidst crisis, including armed conflict, climate hazards, economic crisis, and instances of entangled “polycrisis” (Laurence et al. 2022).

Crisis is often conceptualized as a temporary event and rupture with everyday life. However, rather than being transitory, crisis and its effects tend to endure (Vigh, 2008), leaving lasting imprints on society and sociality (Berckmoes, 2022). In a crisis, ways of being and relating that are usually taken for granted are often questioned anew, often forging social change in ways more radical than those implied by the "fresh contact" that younger generations are typically expected to encounter based on existing and shared cultural material (cf. Mannheim, 1993 [1927]). These crisis-induced changes can be frightening to experience, leading some people to hold on to worlds that no longer exist, while other people adapt in anticipation. Exploring intergenerational relations in the context of crisis allows us to reflect on the transformative and enduring effects of crisis (cf. Dickson-Gomez, 2001; De Bruijn and Both, 2018).

For this Special Issue, we invite contributions based on original fieldwork related to crisis-affected contexts that explore how crisis reverberates in families and across generations. We regard generation as a genealogical relation of kinship (Alber, Van der Geest and Whyte, 2008). Potential questions that may be explored (although others related to the Special Issue’s theme are highly welcome) include:

• How does crisis forge new ways of showing intergenerational care and solidarity, as well as cause distance and friction?
• How does crisis alter or reiterate ideals regarding what amounts to being a ‘good’ child, young, a parent, or other kin, as well as affect opportunities to live up to these ideals?
• How are legacies of distress and resilience passed on to future generations?
• How can intergenerational relations shape society’s ability to bounce back after a crisis?
• How do crisis experiences affect ‘ordinary people’s’ abilities to prevent new crises–known as cyclical crises–from emerging? 

Background questions about generations and families enable us to anchor findings about crisis-related social change and continuity within a specific time and space. Considering intergenerational (dis)connections also allows us to think of changes as potentially gradual and complex, rather than as ruptures that sever the past from the present and the future (Cole, 2010). Finally, addressing these questions will help to empower ordinary people – family and kin – as actors able to shape their own familial and societal futures.

We request that prior to submitting a manuscript, interested authors initially submit a proposed title and an abstract of 400-600 words summarizing their intended contribution. Please send the initial contribution to the Guest Editor (Dr. Lidewyde Berckmoes, Email: [email protected]) or to the /Genealogy/ Editorial Office ([email protected]). Abstracts will be reviewed by the Guest Editor for the purposes of ensuring that it fits within the scope of the Special Issue. Full manuscripts will undergo double-blind peer review.

References

Alber, E., Van Der Geest, S., & Whyte, S. R. (Eds.). (2008). Generations in Africa: connections and conflicts (Vol. 33). LIT Verlag Münster.

Berckmoes, L.H. (2022). In the aftermath of atrocities: Research on the intergenerational transmission of trauma and violence, in Barbora Holá, Hollie Nyseth Nzitatira, and Maartje Weerdesteijn (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Atrocity Crimes (online edn, Oxford Academic, 18 Mar. 2022), https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190915629.013.24, accessed 4 Aug. 2023.

Cole, J. (2010) Sex and Salvation: Imagining the Future in Madagascar. Chicago and London; The University of Chicago Press.

De Bruijn, M., & Both, J. (2018). Introduction: understanding experiences and decisions in situations of enduring hardship in Africa. Conflict and Society, 4(1), 186–198.

Dickson‐Gómez, J. (2002). The sound of barking dogs: violence and terror among Salvadoran families in the postwar. Medical Anthropology Quarterly, 16(4), 415–438.

Lawrence, M., Janzwood, S., & Homer-Dixon, T. (2022). What is a global polycrisis. Cascade Institute, Technical Paper, 4.

Mannheim, K. (1993 [1927]) The Problem of Generations. In: From Karl Mannheim, ed. Kurt H. Wolff, 351–398. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction.

Vigh, (2008). Crisis and chronicity: Anthropological perspectives on continuous conflict and decline. Ethnos, 73(1), 5–24.

Dr. Lidewyde Berckmoes
Dr. Carola Tize
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Genealogy is an international peer-reviewed open access quarterly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• generation
• intergenerational relations
• family
• crisis
• war
• climate change
• polycrisis
• social change
• sociality
• care