Skip to main navigation menu Skip to main content Skip to site footer
FrancoAngeli Journals

Articles/Articoli

Vol. 17 No. 1 (2026): Educating for Complexity: Intersectionality, Decolonial Approaches to Teaching, and Practices of Care in Education

Decolonizing the gaze through the practice of care. The M.A.R.G.E. project for supporting competent parenting and maternal empowerment

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3280/ess1-2026oa22491
Submitted
aprile 10, 2026
Published
2026-07-28

Abstract

This contribution presents the preliminary project M.A.R.G.E.- Mothers in Networks for Parenting Empowerment as a Participatory Action Research practice (Lucisano & Salerni, 2025), implemented in contexts of social complexity and educational marginality (Iavarone & Girardi, 2026) in Naples. The initiative engages networks of young local mothers and refugee women seeking asylum in Mediation-Education pathways focused on care and the maternal dimension (Girardi & Gemma, 2024), aimed at fostering competent parenting (Iavarone, 2025). Through creative practices (McNiff, 2008), participatory workshops - emotional mapping, listening circles, and embroidery - activate processes of self-narration and peer learning, configuring themselves as open spaces of interaction with the local community. Within a framework of situated intersectionality (Schmoll, 2022) and a decolonial perspective (Borghi, 2020), the expected outcomes concern personal empowerment, the strengthening of the parent-child relationship, and the development of forms of active participation, promoting alternative narratives that reframe the margin as a generative space of care, transformation, and individual and collective self-awareness.

References

  1. Baldacci M. (2001). Metodologia della ricerca pedagogica: l’indagine empirica nell’educazione. Milano: Bruno Mondadori.
  2. Biffi D. (2025). Auto-etnografia dell’accoglienza. Lavorare nei servizi per richiedenti asilo e rifugiati. Bergamo: Edizioni Junior.
  3. Boffo V., Iavarone M. L., & Nuzzaci A. (2022). Life skills and human transitions life skills e transizioni umane. Form@re, 22(3), 1-8. DOI: 10.13128/form-14130.
  4. Borghi R. (2020). Decolonialità e privilegio: pratiche femministe e critica al sistema-mondo. Mimesis: Milano.
  5. Coggi C., & Ricchiardi P. (2005). Progettare la ricerca empirica in educazione. Roma: Carocci.
  6. Crenshaw K. W. (2013). Mapping the margins: Intersectionality, identity politics, and violence against women of color. In: The public nature of private violence (pp. 93-118). Routledge.
  7. feminoska (2017). Intersezionalità. Di oppressioni e privilegi in Sarat Colling, Animali in rivolta. Mimesis: Milano.
  8. Frank, G. D., Fox, D., Njue, C., & Dawson, A. (2021). The maternity experiences of women seeking asylum in high-income countries: a meta-ethnography. Women and Birth, 34(6): 531-539.
  9. Girardi F., & Gemma S. (2024). Contro-narrare la migrazione al femminile: l’esperienza delle madri del SAI di Procida. Educational reflective practices, 1: 117-131. DOI: 10.3280/erp1-2024oa18294.
  10. Hall Budd L. (1997). ‘Looking Back, Looking Forward: Reflections on the Origins of the International Particpatory Research Network and the Participatory Research Group in Toronto, Canada?. Paper presented at the Midwest Research to Practice Conference in Adult Continuing Education, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, 15-17 October.
  11. Higginbottom G., Reime B., Bharj K., Chowbey P., Ertan K., Foster-Boucher C., ... & Salway S. (2013). Migration and maternity: insights of context, health policy, and research evidence on experiences and outcomes from a three country preliminary study across Germany, Canada, and the United Kingdom. Health Care for Women International, 34(11): 936-965.
  12. Hooks b. (2018). Elogio del margine (a cura di) Maria Nadotti. Tamu: Napoli.
  13. Iavarone M. L. (2025). L’educazione patetica. Tra disorientamento, crisi ed errori educativi del nostro tempo. Milano: FrancoAngeli.
  14. Iavarone M.L. & Girardi F. (2026). Fleeing Women. Narratives of resilience and re-building of relationships on Procida Island. In A. Schiedi, F. De Matteis (a cura di). Mediterrae. Perspectives of interculturale dialogue among peoples of the Mediterranean: Governance, Welgare, Sustainability (pp. 185-202). McGraw-Hill.
  15. Liberti F. (2026). Prendersi Cura: Re-immaginare Spazi e Relazioni in prospettiva indigena e femminista. Tesi di dottorato, Uniparthenope.
  16. Lorde A. (2022). Sorella Ousider: Scritti politici. Mimesis: Milano.
  17. Lucisano P., & Salerni A. (2002). Metodologia della ricerca in educazione e formazione. Roma: Carocci.
  18. McNiff S. (2008). Arts based research. In: Knowles G. and Cole A.(Eds.). Handbook of the Arts in Qualitative Inquiry: Perspectives, Methodologies, Examples, and Issues, 20-39.
  19. Nicolaides A., & Kwon C. K. (2023). Generative pedagogy: learning to become responseable. In: Research Handbook on the Student Experience in Higher Education (pp. 237-251). Edward Elgar Publishing.
  20. O’Neill M. (2018). Walking, well-being and community: Racialized mothers buil-ding cultural citizenship using participatory arts and participatory action research. In: Migrant Mothers’ Creative Challenges to Racialized Citizenship (pp. 73-97). London: Routledge.
  21. Orefice P. (2006). La ricerca azione partecipativa: Teoria e pratiche. Napoli: Liguori.
  22. Pangas J., Ogunsiji O., Elmir R., Raman S., Liamputtong P., Burns E., ... & Schmied V. (2019). Refugee women’s experiences negotiating motherhood and maternity care in a new country: A meta-ethnographic review. International Journal of Nursing Studies, 90: 31-45.
  23. Postic M., & De Ketele J.M. (1993). Osservare le situazioni educative. I metodi osservativi nella ricerca e nella valutazione (I. Angelucci, trans.). Torino: Società Editrice Internazionale (Original work published 1988).
  24. Reason P. and Bradbury H. (eds) (2001). Handbook of Action Research: Participative Inquiry and Practice. London: Sage.
  25. Rolling Jr J. H. (2016). Arts-based research: Systems and strategies. Art Education, 69(3): 4-5. DOI: 10.1080/00043125.2016.1158561.
  26. Russo M., & Arciprete, C. (2022). Strumenti di valutazione per il case management degli interventi socioeducativi: un approccio basato sul capability framework. Rivista italiana di educazione familiare, 20(1): 17-32. DOI: 10.36253/rief-12250.
  27. Schmoll C. (2022). Le dannate del mare. Donne e frontiere nel Mediterraneo. Pisa: Astarte Edizioni.
  28. Schmoll C. (2025). Chacun sa place. Une géographie morale des mobilités. CNRS.
  29. Vygotskij L.S. (1931-1980). Il processo cognitivo. Boringhieri: Torino.

Metrics

Metrics Loading ...