Dr Kristen CheneyDirector of the School of Child and Youth Care, University of Victoria, British Columbia, CanadaEmail: kcheney@uvic.caProfilePublicationsExpertiseProfile"Dr. Cheney’s research deals with children’s survival strategies amidst difficult circumstances and the politics of international development and humanitarian intervention for such children, primarily in Eastern and Southern Africa. Her work takes an explicitly child-centered approach that considers how children experience and respond to the various hegemonic institutional and structural elements of global and local development practices.Her most recent research examines the impact of the global 'orphan industrial complex'—including orphan tourism, childcare institutions, and intercountry adoption—on child protection in developing countries. Author of two monographs, one edited volume, and many articles, she has also led several studies using youth participatory research to explore issues of young people’s sexual and reproductive health, including as PI for the Oak Foundation project Adolescents’ Perceptions of Healthy Relationships project (2017-2021). "ResearchPublications (2019) Disadvantaged Childhoods and Humanitarian Intervention: Processes of Affective Commodification and Objectification Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave MacMillan (ed., with A. Sinervo). (2018) “Decolonizing Childhood Studies: Overcoming Patriarchy and Prejudice in Child-related Research and Practice” In S. Spyrou, D. Cook and R. Rosen (eds) Re-imagining Childhood Studies, 91-104. London: Bloomsbury Press. (2017) Crying for Our Elders: African Orphanhood in the Age of HIV and AIDS Chicago, The University of Chicago Press. (2017) “Addicted to Orphans: How the Global Orphan Industrial Complex Jeopardizes Local Child Protection Systems” (with K.S. Rotabi) In: T. Skelton, C. Harker, and K. Hörschelmann (eds), Conflict, Violence and Peace. Geographies of Children and Young People, vol 11, 89-107. Singapore: Springer Singapore. (2011) “Children as Ethnographers: Reflections on the importance of participatory research in assessing orphans’ needs”, Childhood, 18(2): 166-79. (2010) “Deconstructing Childhood Vulnerability: An Introduction”, Childhood in Africa, 2010, 2(1): 4-7.(2007) Pillars of the Nation: Child Citizens and Ugandan National Development Chicago, The University of Chicago Press. ExpertiseHumanitarianism, orphanhood, adoption, alternative care, child protection, participatory methodology, international development practice, sexual and reproductive health