Paper Short Abstract:

This paper explores the participation of Cacua children in their indigenous community in the Colombian Amazon, my participation in the everyday lives of these children, and the children’s participation in this research. I explore how a ‘childlike’ curiosity to learn poses questions for anthropology.

Paper Abstract:

This paper explores the importance children’s learning through their participation in all kinds of everyday activities in the indigenous Cacua village where I undertook 18-months of fieldwork in the Colombian Amazon. In turn, I found that children, even as young as 3-years-old, enhanced my own learning through encouraging me to participate in tasks essential to living in their community, just as the adults and older children in their lives did with them. From reflecting on children’s participation in everyday activities in the household and wider community, and my participation in the everyday lives of these children, I reflect on children’s participation in this research through drawing, photo voice, photo elicitation and other so called ‘child friendly’ research methods. I explore the relationship between these different forms of participation, as well as relations of power as I learnt from children much more skilled than I in so many respects, but who also became dependent on me in different ways as I taught them ‘participatory methods.’ This reflection poses questions for anthropology more generally with regards to methodology, modes of participation, relations of power and the power of a ‘childlike’ curiosity to learn.