Ethnography of Paternal Engagements in a Parisian Day Nursery

Discover the tenth session of the 2025–2026 seminar series "Crossed Perspectives on Early Childhood": "Ethnography of Paternal Engagements in a Parisian Day Nursery".

The seminar will be held in French.

The seminar approaches early childhood as a social, historical, and cultural construct. Knowledge and theories relating to conception, birth, and child development are analysed in terms of the child’s interactions with their surroundings and according to gender norms. The seminar also explores the boundaries of this age category and its temporality, according to medical, international, anthropological, and historical standards.

While nurseries remain largely mother-centered spaces today, little research has been done on how fathers find their place in them. How do they get involved in practical terms? This paper is based on an ethnographic study conducted intermittently between 2018 and 2024 in seven Parisian nurseries. Based on observations made during drop-off and pick-up times and biographical interviews, it analyzes the forms of involvement of fathers in three family configurations: in heterosexual couples, after a breakup, and in same-sex parent families. The study reveals the many different ways of being a father in daycare, shaped by life experiences, gendered norms of care, and institutional expectations. It thus sheds light on the diversity of roles that fathers negotiate, or do not negotiate, in a space designed primarily for mothers.

• Mike Marchal: PhD in sociology, IRIS, EHESS
• Discussant: Michel-Christian: Historian, University of Geneva