El furor de mis ardores: amor y deseo, odio y muerte

In 1851, Henry Mathew first introduced the term street children in his book on London ‘Street folk’. The term street children became popular only after UN introduced it in the 1979 ‘Year of the Child’ campaign to raise awareness of global issues impacting children (Graham, 2011). The term ‘street children’

basically refers to children who spend most of the time on the street, living in poverty and under vulnerable conditions. However, the definition of street

children has been greatly debated internationally because of categorisations based on their age group, their contact with family and the nature of any work they do, all of which cause difficulty in specifying street children in research.

No single definition has been universally accepted and different terms and definitions are used interchangeably (Graham, 2011). One of the reasons that makes universal consensus on the definition of street children difficult to achieve is because of cultural variations across countries (Graham, 2011) . Also there are differences in ideological and theoretical backgrounds of childhood specialists and

42 the notion of childhood itself varies according to cultural and ideological

positions. The term street children has negative connotations as it is associated with begging and robbery and while this is not an accurate depiction of most children, many workers with street children are dissatisfied with the term

(Graham, 2011). The new widely used term for street children is ‘children in street situations’ as it implies a temporary condition, is flexible enough to include

children who both live and work on the street and the description does not make street life the defining characteristics of the child (Graham, 2011)

One definition of street children is that provided by an international network of organisations who work in the field: “any girl or boy who has not reached adulthood, for whom the street (in the broadest sense of the word, including unoccupied dwellings, wasteland, etc.) has become her or his habitual abode and/or sources of livelihood, and who is inadequately protected, supervised or directed by responsible adults” (Inter-NGO, 1985). This definition was formulated by Inter-NGO in Switzerland in 1983 and is similar to how the United Nations defines a street child: “any girl or boy for whom the street is his or her habitual abode and/or source of livelihood, and who is inadequately protected, supervised or directed by responsible adults” (International Catholic Children’s Bureau, 1985, p.58).

In 1986, UNICEF categorised street children based on their street status and their contact with family. These categories refer to children as being ‘on’ the street and

‘of’ the street. Children ‘on’ the street are those who spend most of the time on the street but return home at night and live with their family. They contribute their earnings to their family. Children ‘of’ the street are identified as permanent residents of the streets with limited or no contact with their families. They leave their home and/or their families are disintegrated (Scanlon, Tomkins, & Scanlon, 1998). The definition of street children offered by UNICEF is widely accepted. As my aim was to study the risk and vulnerability of children who spend most of their time in the street and who have little contact with their family, I adopted UNICEF

43 definition of children ‘of’ the street described as children who live most of the time in the street without having contact with the family.

2.2.1.1Clarifying Concepts- Children ‘of’ the street’

The literature review showed that a greater number of the children ‘of’ the street possessed drugs and were involved in high-risk sexual activity as compared to children ‘on’ the street’ (Inciardi & Suratt, 1997). A possible explanation for this could be that their involvement in drugs abuse and violence was due to being deprived of family protection and supervision (Inciardi & Suratt, 1997). A few researchers have included children both ‘on’ and ‘of’ the street in their studies (Kruger & Richter, 2003; Moon, Binson, Shafer, & Diaz, 2001; Olley, 2006;

Raffaelli et al., 1993; Swart-Kruger & Richter, 1997; Tadele, 2003; Wutoh et al., 2006). The researchers who addressed both categories of street children found that children ‘of’ the street were a higher risk group for HIV/AIDS than children ‘on’

the street (Anarfi, 1997; Kruger & Richter, 2003; Moon et al., 2001; Raffaelli et al., 1993; Swart-Kruger & Richter, 1997).

Children ‘of’ the street were sexually active (Raffaelli et al., 1993) and had sexual relationships at an earlier age compared to children ‘on’ the street (Kruger &

Richter, 2003). They were reported to have less knowledge and had a greater variety of misconceptions than children ‘on’ the street (Kruger & Richter, 2003;

Swart-Kruger & Richter, 1997). They had multiple sexual relationships (Moon et al., 2001). Moon et al. (2001) reported that a significant number of children ‘of’

the street (95%) were likely to use tobacco and injection drugs, and inconsistent condom use was more significant and was more strongly associated with

exchange of needles and unprotected sex. Moreover, Kruger & Richter reported that many children ‘of’ the street avoided seeking medical help from doctors and tried to ‘sleep off’ their illness, as compared to children ‘on’ the street.

44 It has been confirmed that children ‘of’ the street are identified as having less knowledge regarding transmission and prevention, including many serious

misconceptions, negative attitudes and higher risk sexual behaviour (Anarfi, 1997;

Dube, 1997; Gurung, 2004; Kruger & Richter, 2003; Lockhart, 2002; Pakistan Voluntary Health and Nutrition Association (PAVHNA), 2004; Ryckmans, 2008;

Southon & Gurung, 2006; Swart-Kruger & Richter, 1997; Tadele, 2003). Moon et al. (2001) suggested however that there were no significant differences between children ‘of’ and ‘on’ the street regarding their number of sexual partners, frequency of using condoms and use of drugs, including intravenous drugs. And, these two groups are not mutually exclusive categories, since children may move, share and learn very quickly between these states (Young & Barrett, 2001).

Therefore, while I adopted the term children ‘of’ the street for this study, the research provides understanding of risks and vulnerability of both groups of children. This approach is in line with my review of the literature which does not distinguish between these different groups.

2.2.1.2Operationalising the Definition

Children ‘on’ and ‘of’ the street in this research were identified by asking the question “Do you go to home to sleep?” The respondents who slept on the street were considered as ‘children ^ofthe street’, whilst children who went to a home, or to a shelter run by welfare organisations, were considered as ‘children ^on the street’^. The emphasis (in italics) identifies these as distinct (though inter-related) categories. It is also important to be reminded of the distinct (but inter-related) categories of risks that street children are exposed to, as discussed earlier in the chapter. Here my emphasis on pre-street factors, street risk factors, aggravating risk factors and perpetuating risk factors indicates these as distinct clusters of risk factors that feed into each other. These concepts are presented in a theoretical model set out in chapter three. Henceforth, the term children ‘of’ the street in the

45 research process is used interchangeably with children ‘on’ the street, street children, street boys and girls or young children.

2.2.1.3 Conceptualisations of Childhood

Although the study is of children, I have also included a number of young people (up to the age of 24 years). My reasons for this are both conceptual and

methodological. As is widely acknowledged, childhood is a socially constructed phase of life (Morrow, 2011), influenced by cultural, historic and social factors. In Nepal, age (rather than other social markers, such as marriage) is the primary determinant of childhood, with children being considered to be in childhood until the age of 18 regardless of what roles and levels of responsibility or maturity they have reached. Fifty percent of Nepalese people are married as children, however they still retain the status of child (regardless of marital role and responsibility) until they reach the age of majority; this is because the legal age for marriage is 20 years (Newar, 2011). Despite this, the Ministry of Health and Population reports that approximately 23 percent of girls are married between the ages of 15 to19 years and in many rural areas girls may be married as young as 11 to 13. So that while girls can be married at a very young age (child marriage is common in Nepal), these girls are still considered children within the context of marriage until they are 20 (the legal age of marriage) and thus stay embedded within the system of patriarchal control (firstly as children under the control of parents and then as wives under the control of husbands and husband’s families) (Luitel, 2001). Street children live within the broader context of a patriarchal society but do not live within a family structure of family patriarchal controls but then neither do they experience parental care or supervision. From the time they arrive on the streets and regardless of what age they are, they must become adults in the sense that they must fend for themselves and take complete responsibility for their own survival. The normal social rules about childhood as linked to age do not apply and for this reason, it was pragmatic to be flexible about the determination of age

46 especially as many young people had not official record of birth and the age given was often an estimated guess.

There were methodological advantages too in taking a fluid approach to defining childhood; by including youth in the study, I was able to include the experiences of young people who had spent the greater part of their childhoods on the street, that is they had grown up on the street and their retrospective reflections together with their lived realities at this older age contributes to this notion of a complete phenomenon.