Professor Rachel Holmes

Professor of Cultural Studies of Childhood

My profile

Biography

I lead the Children and Childhood Research Group in ESRI. My research activities in the field of cultural studies of childhood appreciate the complexity of the contemporary worlds that young children, families and communities occupy. The work I engage with includes the development of theoretically-driven intellectual, as well as diverse empirical, research and evaluation projects.

My research works across the interstices of applied educational research, social science research and arts-based research within cultures of childhood. It develops critical trans-disciplinarity that rethinks, questions and challenges the ways babies, children and young people are conceptualised and produced through practices, policy and academia in the 21st century. My immersions in post-structuralism, postmodernism, feminism, feminist post-structuralism, deconstruction and more recently posthumanism and feminist new materialisms, enables my work to consider more adequate accounts of the ways that life and social processes and the more-than-human affect the worlds that children inhabit. 

The research projects I am involved with are designed to promote research innovation and the creation of new critical knowledge about children and young people by developing creative approaches to methodology, engaging with challenging theoretical landscapes and being mindful of the complex ethical implications in the work I do with colleagues. Our commitment to breaking new ground is crucial in seeking imaginative ways of developing different futures for the child, young person and her family.

Get in touch

0161 247 2059
Education and Social Research Institute Brooks Building

Impact

Birth to three: the Odd Project

Transforming the education of – and care for – young children.

Read more

Projects

Chattering Nineteen to the Dozen (CND) £20K (March-January 2013) An Action Research Project led by Liz Jones, Rachel Holmes and Helen Davenport in conjunction with three combined Bradford Early Years Children’s Centres/Nursery Schools and three Bradford Primary Schools. The two main aims of the project were:

  • to establish the factors, variables and dynamics that predispose and encourage (some) children to talk and chatter both within the context of home communities and nursery school;
  • identify why it is that some children who have comparable cultural and socio economic backgrounds to other more fluent language speakers appear reluctant to chatter and talk as freely when in the nursery classroom.

The team produced a report and a film. Both the report and the film are carefully designed so as to enable staff development in relation to encouraging children’s chatter.

Action for Children: Evaluation of the Mother and Baby Unit. HMP Styal Project Researcher £30K (2009-2010)

Stockport Metropolitan Borough Council and SureStart Fatherhood Project. Project Co-Director £19.5K (2009-10)

The Manchester Museum: Alchemy Enquire Project Co-Director £5K (2007-2008)

The Esmée Fairbairn Foundation: consultancy to undertake strand 8/2 Primary Schools and Other Agencies Primary Review Research Briefing. Director Professor Robin Alexander, Cambridge University - Research Consultant £1.1K (2007-2008)

The Esmée Fairbairn Foundation: Imaginative Journeys Project Director £36.5K (2006)

The Esmée Fairbairn Foundation: The Lion’s Story Project Director £19.4K (2004)

The Esmée Fairbairn Foundation: Birth to Three Training Matters Project Research team member (2002-2006)

DfES/SureStart: Birth to Three Matters Project Core research team member (2001-2002)

The Esmée Fairbairn Foundation: Playgroup Project - Comparative study of UK and Northern Ireland Research team member £319.5K (2001)

Teaching

Postgraduate teaching

  • MA Social Research
  • EdDoc
  • BA(Hons) Childhood Studies

Supervision

ESRC-funded Studentships

  • 2-Curious: More Than Words (Collaborative Award with Curious Minds)
  • Affecting space: an interdisciplinary ethnography at Manchester Art Gallery (Collaborative Award with MAG)

VC Studentships

  • Artist as Residency
  • Women in comedy
  • Young children’s relationship with food
  • Young children and objects in the art gallery and museum
  • Young children’s sense of belonging in the Foundation Stage

PhD and EdDoc Supervision

  • Film and School Atmospheres
  • Touch
  • Early Years and Philosophical Hauntings
  • Drama in Education
  • Rethinking Transition
  • The ‘disadvantaged’ two-year-old
  • (Non)engagement with early years policy
  • Emotional worlds of education professionals working in special schools
  • Teaching sculpture through multi-sensory approaches
  • Decontextualised learning & teaching in critical studies in secondary art & design education
  • Ways photographic imagery can reconstruct self and other(s) in terms of socio-political identity
  • Teachers’ emotions

Research outputs

My research interests lie across the interstices of applied educational research, social science research and arts-based research within cultures of childhood. Interests are located around notions of ‘childhood territories’ such as ways childhood becomes imag(in)ed through fictional, documentary and ethnographic film; children’s child(self)hood, identities and objects and ways to (left)field childhood via opening up off-centre research methodologies.

  • Artefacts

    Holmes, R., MacLure, M., Jones, L., MacRae, C. (2010) Becoming a Problem: an innovative film resource. http://museumofqualitativedata.info/341/.

  • Books (authored/edited/special issues)

    Hackett, A., Holmes, R., MacRae, C. (2019) Working with young children in museums: Weaving theory and practice.

    Holmes, R. (2018) Foreword.

    Jones, L., Holmes, R., Powell, J. (2005) Early childhood studies: a multiprofessional perspective. Open University Press.

  • Chapters in books

    Barron, I.C. 'Aspects Matter.' Birth to Three Matters: Supporting the Framework of Effective Practice.

    Holmes, R., Ravetz, A. (2023) 'Growing in the midst of things.' Knowing from the Inside Cross-Disciplinary Experiments with Matters of Pedagogy. Bloomsbury Publishing,

    Holmes, R. (2020) 'Performing findings: tales of the theatrical self.' In Ward, M.R.M., Delamont, S. (ed.) Handbook of Qualitative Research in Education. Edward Elgar,

    Hackett, A., MacRae, C., Holmes, R. (2019) 'Introduction to part I.' Working with Young Children in Museums: Weaving Theory and Practice. pp. 15-26.

    Hackett, A., Holmes, R., MacRae, C. (2019) 'Introduction.' Working with Young Children in Museums: Weaving Theory and Practice. pp. 1-11.

    MacRae, C., Hackett, A., Holmes, R. (2019) 'Introduction to part III.' Working with Young Children in Museums: Weaving Theory and Practice. pp. 135-143.

    Hackett, A., MacRae, C., Holmes, R. (2019) 'Introduction to part II.' Working with Young Children in Museums: Weaving Theory and Practice. pp. 77-86.

    Holmes, R., Jones, L., Osgood, J. (2018) 'Mundane Habits, Ordinary Affects, and Methodological Creations.' In Cutter-Mackenzie-Knowles, A., Malone, K., Hacking, E.B. (ed.) Research Handbook on Childhoodnature Assemblages of Childhood and Nature Research. Springer,

    Anastasiou, T., Holmes, R., Runswick-Cole, K. (2018) 'Becoming monstrous: On the limits of the body of a child.' Writing with Deleuze in the Academy: Creating Monsters. pp. 45-60.

    Holmes, R., Jones, L. (2015) 'Flickering, spilling and diffusing body/knowledge in the posthuman early years.' Posthuman Research Practices in Education. Palgrave Macmillan,

    Holmes, R., MacLure, M., Jones, L., MacRae, C. (2015) 'Silence as resistance to analysis. Or, on not opening one's mouth properly.' In Otterstad, A.M., Reinertsen, A.N., Reinertsen, A.B. (ed.) Metodefestival og øyeblikksrealisme [Method-celebration/party and moments of realism]. Norway: Fagbokforlage,

    Jones, E.M., Holmes, R. (2014) 'Working with New Research Practices.' In Brooker, E., Blaise, M., Edwards, S. (ed.) SAGE Handbook of Play and Learning in Early Childhood.

    Jones, L., Holmes, R. (2014) 'Studying play through new research practices.' The SAGE Handbook of Play and Learning in Early Childhood. pp. 128-140.

    Jones, L., Holmes, R., MacLure, M. (2012) 'Disturbing cultures of incarceration : resilience, the struggle for normality and the imprisoned family.' Comparative early childhood education services: international perspectives. Palgrave Macmillan,

    Barron, I., Holmes, R., MacLure, M., Runswick-Cole, K. (2012) 'Primary schools and other agencies.' The Cambridge Primary Review Research Surveys. pp. 97-135.

    MacLure, M., Jones, L., Holmes, R., MacRae, C. (2010) 'Childhood and the construction of critical research practices.' Childhoods: a handbook. Peter Lang Publishing,

    Jones, L., Holmes, R., MacLure, M., MacRae, C. (2010) 'Critical politics of play.' Childhoods: a handbook. Peter Lang Publishing,

    Jones, L., Holmes, R., MacRae, C., MacLure, M. (2010) ''Improper' children.' Contemporary perpectives on early childhood education. Open University Press,

    Holmes, R., Barron, I. (2005) 'Exploring representations of children and childhood in history and film: silencing a voice that is already blue in the face from shouting.' , Early childhood studies: a multiprofessional perspective. Open University Press,

  • Reports

    Jones, L., Holmes, R., van Gaalen, N. Evaluation of the Clore Art Studio: a continuous swirling line, vibrant colour and humble objects.

    Holmes, R., Arculus, C., Macrae, B. 2-Curious: A pilot investigation into the potential of performance-based practice in dialogue with early years practice in two funded two-year old settings.

    Holmes, R., MacRae, C., Moakes, K., McNulty, J. (2019) Specialist Leaders in Cultural Education (SLICE®) Early Years Fellowships 2019. Curious Minds.

    Jones, E.M., Holmes, R., van Gaalen, N. (2014) Evaluation of the Clore Art Studio. Manchester Metropolitan University.

    Holmes, R., Jones, L., Davenport, H. (2013) Chattering Nineteen to the Dozen: End of Project Report to Bradford City Council.

    Holmes, R. (2013) Generating Alternative Discourses of Childhood as a Resource for Educational Policy Making: Impact report to ESRC. ESRC.

    Barron, I., Holmes, R., MacLure, M., Runswick-Cole, K. (2012) Primary schools and other agencies. Cambridge Primary Review (University of Cambridge, Faculty of Education).

    Holmes, R., Jones, L., MacLure, M., Browne, K. (2011) An Evaluation of the Mother and Baby Unit at HM Prison Styal.. Action for Children.

    Holmes, R., Maclure, M.V. (2011) Addressing 'problem behaviour' in the early years: an innovative film resource (Ref RES-189-25-0122). Economic and Social Research Council.

    Jones, L., Holmes, R. (2011) Evaluation of Hit the Ground Crawling..

    Jones, L., MacRae, C., Holmes, R. (2008) Evaluation of the Alchemy Enquire Initiative.

    Holmes, R., Johnson, B., Griffin, B., Naib, H., MacRae, C., Matsoukari-Stylianou, C. (2007) Imaginative journeys: evaluation of early years enablers work at Eureka!.

    Barron,, I., Holmes, R., MacClure, M. (2007) Relationships between Education and Other Agencies. Primary Review Research Report. Primary Review.

    Holmes, R. (2004) The Lion’s Story: an evaluation of young children in the art gallery.

  • Journal articles

    Holmes, R., Ravetz, A. (2024) 'Spitting open the sky: eruptions of difference in an early years classroom.' International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education,

    Ravetz, A., Holmes, R., Ray, J. (2021) 'Spitting Open the Sky.' CSA Lateral (ISSN 2469–4053),

    Boycott-Garnett, R., Macrae, B., Hackett, A., Otito Tamsho-Thomas, T., Holmes, R. (2020) 'Bonbonnieres in the gallery: (re)presenting sugar in a family gallery space.' The International Journal of Art & Design Education, 39(4) pp. 754-769.

    Holmes, R. (2020) 'Paroxysm: The Problem of the Fist.' Cultural Studies <=> Critical Methodologies, 20(5) pp. 496-509.

    Hackett, A., Holmes, R., MacRae, C., Procter, L. (2018) 'Editorial: Young children’s museum geographies: spatial, material and bodily ways of knowing.' Children's Geographies, 16(5) pp. 481-488.

    Macrae, B.C., Hackett, A., Holmes, R., Jones, L. (2017) 'Vibrancy, repetition, movement: posthuman theories for reconceptualising young children in museums.' Children's Geographies, 16(5) pp. 503-515.

    Frigerio, A., Benozzo, A., Holmes, R., Runswick-Cole, K. (2017) 'The Doing and Undoing of the “Autistic Child”: Cutting Together and Apart Interview-Based Empirical Materials.' Qualitative Inquiry, 24(6) pp. 390-402.

    Gallagher, M., Prior, J., Needham, M., Holmes, R. (2017) 'Listening differently: A pedagogy for expanded listening.' British Educational Research Journal, 43(6) pp. 1246-1265.

    Holmes, R., Jones, L., Rossholt, N., Anastasiou, T. (2016) 'Masticating ‘quality’ and spitting the bits out.' Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood, 17(1) pp. 26-38.

    Jones, L., Osgood, J., Holmes, R., Urban, M. (2016) 'Reimagining quality in early childhood.' Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood, 17

    Holmes, R. (2015) 'My tongue on your theory: the bittersweet reminder of every-thing unnameable.' Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 37(5) pp. 662-679.

    Holmes, R. (2014) 'Fresh Kills: The Spectacle of (De)Composing Data.' Qualitative Inquiry, 20(6) pp. 781-789.

    Jones, L., Osgood, J., Urban, M., Holmes, R., MacLure, M. (2014) 'Eu(rope): (Re)assembling, (Re)casting, and (Re)aligning Lines of De- and Re-territorialisation of Early Childhood.' International Review of Qualitative Research, 7(1) pp. 58-79.

    Holmes, R., Jones, L. (2013) 'Flesh, wax, horse skin, and hair: The many intensities of data.' Cultural Studies - Critical Methodologies, 13(4) pp. 357-372.

    Holmes, R. (2012) 'A Fantastic Decomposition: Unsettling the Fury of Having to Wait.' American Journal of Men's Health, 6(5) pp. 544-556.

    Holmes, R. (2012) 'A Fantastic Decomposition: Unsettling the Fury of Having to Wait.' Qualitative Inquiry, 18(7) pp. 544-556.

    MacLure, M., Jones, L., Holmes, R., MacRae, C. (2012) 'Becoming a problem: Behaviour and reputation in the early years classroom.' British Educational Research Journal, 38(3) pp. 447-471.

    Holmes, R., Jones, L. (2012) 'Limitless provocations of the ‘safe’, ‘secure’ and ‘healthy’ child.' International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 26(1) pp. 75-99.

    Holmes, R. (2012) 'Performing findings: Tales of the theatrical self.' pp. 550-561.

    Jones, L., MacLure, M., Holmes, R., MacRae, C. (2011) 'Children and objects: Affection and infection.' Early Years, 32(1) pp. 49-60.

    Holmes, R. (2010) 'Risky pleasures: Using the work of graffiti writers to theorize the act of ethnography.' Qualitative Inquiry, 16(10) pp. 871-882.

    MacLure, M., Holmes, R., MacRae, C., Jones, L. (2010) 'Animating classroom ethnography: Overcoming video-fear.' International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 23(5) pp. 543-556.

    Jones, L., Holmes, R., Macrae, C., Maclure, M. (2010) 'Documenting classroom life: How can I write about what I am seeing?.' Qualitative Research, 10(4) pp. 479-491.

    MacLure, M., Holmes, R., Jones, L., MacRae, C. (2010) 'Silence as resistance to analysis: Or, on not opening one's mouth properly.' Qualitative Inquiry, 16(6) pp. 492-500.

    Holmes, R. (2009) 'Cinemaethnographic specta(c)torship: Discursive readings of what we choose to (dis)possess.' Cultural Studies - Critical Methodologies, 10(3) pp. 221-237.

    Holmes, R. (2009) 'Theatre of the self: Autobiography as performance.' International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 22(4) pp. 399-416.

    Holmes, R. (2007) 'East is East: Using film to disrupt university classroom narratives around childhood and identity.' Pedagogy, Culture and Society, 15(3) pp. 367-384.

    McCreery, E., Jones, L., Holmes, R. (2007) 'Why do Muslim parents want Muslim schools?.' Early years, 27(3) pp. 203-219.

  • Conference papers

    Holmes, R., Jones, L. (2015) 'Flickering Alchemy: curating noisy transgenic empirical creatures.' In The Dark Precursor. International Conference on Deleuze and Artistic Research. Ghent, Belgium, 9/11/2015 - 11/11/2015.

    Holmes, R., Jones, L. (2015) 'Flickering, spilling and diffusing gender/body/knowledge in the posthuman early years.' In Gender and Education. University of Roehampton, 24/6/2015 - 26/6/2015.

    Holmes, R. (2014) 'My Tongue on Your Theory: Bittersweet ‘quality’ (in) research.' In British Educational Research Association. London, 8/9/2014 - 11/9/2014.

    Holmes, R. (2014) 'Cannibalising Data.' In Tenth International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA, 21/5/2014 - 26/5/2014.

    Holmes, R. (2014) 'Putting affect into play: playing with affect.' In Tenth International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA, 21/5/2014 - 26/5/2014.

    Jones, L., Holmes, R. (2014) 'The Spectacle of (De)Composing Data.' In the Bringing Critical Thinking into Life in Academia workshop. University Of Helsinki, 4/4/2014 -

    Holmes, R. (2012) 'Fresh kills: the spectacle of (de)composing data.' In British Educational Research Association. Manchester, 3/9/2012 - 6/9/2013.

    Holmes, R. (2012) 'Mixing theory? Generating alternative discourses of childhood.' In British Educational Research Association. Manchester, 3/9/2012 - 7/9/2012.

    Jones, L., Holmes, R., Maclure, M. (2012) 'Children's encounters with things.' In British Educational Research Association Conference. Manchester University, 2012 -

    Jones, L., Holmes, R., MacLure, M. (2011) 'Disturbing cultures of incarceration: the struggle for normality and the imprisoned family.' In 19th Reconceptualizing Early Childhood Education Conference. University of East London, 1/10/2011 -

    Maclure, M.V., Holmes, R., Jones, E. (2010) 'The discipline of objects.' In 6th International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry. University of Illinois, 26/5/2010 - 29/5/2010.

    MacLure, M., Holmes, R., Jones, L. (2010) 'Ungrounded Theory and Unfounded Practice: Making a Nuisance of New Sense with Philosophies and Practices of Difference.' In Sixth International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry. Illinois, 2010 -

    Holmes, R., Jones, L. (2010) 'Framing childhood: disrupting mind sets, learning to stutter.' In European Early Childhood Education Association conference. Birmingham, 2010 -

    Jones, L., Holmes, C., MacLure, M., MaCrae, C. (2007) 'What counts as evidence when examining notions of 'naughtiness': am I seeing what you are seeing?.' In 3rd Congress of Qualitative Inquiry. Illinois Champaign Urbana State University, 2007 -

    Jones, L., Holmes, R., McCreery, E. (2007) 'Why do Muslim parents want Muslim schools?.' In 6th Discourse, Power and Resistance. Manchester Metropolitan University, 2007 -

    Jones, L., Holmes, R., MacRae, C., MacLure, M. (2007) 'Pathologising difference: occupying non-conformity in an early years classroom.' In British Educational Research Association. London Institute of Education, 2007 -

    McCreery, E., Holmes, R., Jones, L. (2006) 'Faith Schools.' In Association of University Lecturers in Religion & Education (UK) Religion and Schools in the 21st Century - Challenges and Opportunities. Stranmillis University College, Belfast, 2006 -

  • Other

    MacLure, M., Jones, L., Holmes, R., MacRae, C. (2008) Becoming a problem: how and why children acquire a reputation as ‘naughty’ in the earliest years at school.