Breaking intergenerational transmissions of poverty: Perspectives of street-connected girls in Nairobi

This chapter addresses two aspects of the research project ‘Mitaani hadi shuleni’ meaning ‘from the street into school’, carried out by a university with international civil society partners. First, the subjective well-being indicators of girls and their mothers (following the work of Moncrieffe 2009 and Sumner et al. 2009), and second, their journeys to the streets and the situation they find themselves in when they get there, including understanding their experiences of mobilities and the spaces they occupy (following, for example, ideas of Porter and Mawdsley 2008 on mobility and Mannion 2010 on participatory space). This research has helped to understand the complexity of the girls’ lives on the streets and how interventions could contribute to changing their situation. This fits with Hanson and Nieuwenhuys’ (2013) reconceptualisation of child rights that takes into account children’s complex realities and social justice.