Children as participants in practices: the challenges of practice theories to an actor-centred sociology of childhood

The article examines how new practice theories might provide more advanced theoretical and analytical perspectives for the study of childhood in the social sciences. It moves away from common conceptions of agency with reference to the dichotomy of structure and agency and reflects on the relationship of sociality, agency, and actors as conceived in recent practice theories. In the main section, three key aspects of those theories are introduced and discussed: (1) the corporeality and material-mental structure of practices; (2) the role of artefacts and objects in the performance and reproduction of practices; and (3) the practice-theoretical shift in perspective from intentionally acting human actors to multiple participants of practice and to agency as a feature and effect of practices. The concluding sections discuss the challenges of these practice-theoretical reflections to childhood studies: to the extent that agency is conceptualized not only as a (biographically) incorporated characteristic of children as individuals but as a feature of practices in which children are involved as participants, it is understood to depend on situations and to be more variable, context-sensitive, and complex than has been recognized in the field of childhood studies in the past. Practice theories are thus shown to open up new, differentiated heuristic perspectives for the field of childhood studies, which in turn challenge the adult-centrist approach of practice theories.