Beyond the binaries that keep us from writing with and like children

This chapter was written through a mother/daughter partnership. The mother is a university academic with a PhD in educational technology. The daughter is a digital native (which means that she is of the generation of children who have grown up never experiencing a life without computers and the Internet) in primary school. The initial question compelling this collaboration was, “Why aren’t children encouraged and acknowledged as authentic authors of scholarly publications.” The question was initially framed as a social justice issue about children’s rights and epistemological deprivation. However, what became evident is that the assumed victims might not be interested in our advocacy. Children are not protesting exclusion from authorship of static texts because they have moved on to a different medium entirely. In other words, this chapter was conceived to address the binary of adult/child rights and grew to address the binary of adult/child construction and use of text.