Children's Geographies

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Creating safe atmospheres? Children’s experiences

of grandparents’ affective and spatial responses to
domestic violence

Lucas Gottzén & Linn Sandberg

To cite this article: Lucas Gottzén & Linn Sandberg (2017): Creating safe atmospheres?
Children’s experiences of grandparents’ affective and spatial responses to domestic violence,
Children's Geographies, DOI: 10.1080/14733285.2017.1406896

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/14733285.2017.1406896

Published online: 21 Nov 2017.

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CHILDREN’S GEOGRAPHIES, 2017
https://doi.org/10.1080/14733285.2017.1406896

Creating safe atmospheres? Children’s experiences of

grandparents’ affective and spatial responses to domestic
violence
a
Lucas Gottzén and Linn Sandbergb*
a
Department of Child and Youth Studies, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden; bDepartment of Ethnology,
History of Religions and Gender Studies, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

While grandparenting literature has primarily discussed intergenerational Received 14 November 2016
relations in families with ‘normal’ everyday problems, such as childcare, Accepted 29 September 2017
it has largely neglected more troublesome issues, such as domestic
KEYWORDS
violence. Based on interviews with ten children and teens, this article Affect; atmosphere; violence-
explores grandchildren’s experiences of how their grandparents have exposed children; domestic
responded when they were being exposed to violence in the violence; grandchildren;
intermediate generation. These responses have affective-spatial aspects grandparents
as the grandparents contributed to what we call ‘safe atmospheres’.
Grandparents’ homes often provided a sense of safety, and
grandparents at times contributed to a safe atmosphere in their
grandchildren’s homes and helped to create safety and comfort in non-
domestic places. Some grandparents, however, could be unsupportive
and fail to contribute to safe atmospheres. Although physical space is
important to create safety, in order to create a safe atmosphere, it has
to correspond to a relational movement where grandparents side with
their grandchildren.

Introduction
Relationships between grandchildren and grandparents are often romanticized, and stereotypical
images of grandparents engaged in loving care and activities such as baking, playing games and cud-
dling with grandchildren persist over the years (Kahana and Kahana 1971). These idealized notions
of ‘leisure and pleasure’ tend to ignore conflicts and troubles that may arise within families, not least
experiences of abuse, and how these impact on intergenerational relations (Hughes and Emmel
2012). Children witnessing domestic violence against a parent may be isolated, whereas adult victims
of domestic abuse can seek help and support from relatives and friends (Klein 2012), and grandpar-
ents can therefore become aware of the abuse occurring in their grandchildren’s homes. Previous
research shows that grandparents may be actively engaged in helping their grandchildren, both
emotionally and instrumentally in troubled times (Hughes and Emmel 2012; Sandberg 2016a,
2016b). Also, although grandparents face difficult circumstances when attempting to give support
to grandchildren experiencing domestic violence, and abuse may threaten to disrupt intergenera-
tional relationships, grandparents could still experience the bonds with grandchildren as strong
and committed (Sandberg 2016a, 2016b).
But how do children themselves experience their grandparents’ responses? Little is known about
how individuals in the social network react to domestic violence from the point of view of children

CONTACT Lucas Gottzén lucas.gottzen@buv.su.se

*Present address: School of Culture and Education, Sodertorn University, Huddinge, Sweden
© 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
2 L. GOTTZÉN AND L. SANDBERG

(Klein 2012; but see Åkerlund and Sandberg 2017; Sandberg 2016c). Moreover, there is a paucity of
studies focusing on children’s perspectives on their grandparents’ actions when learning of violence
in the intermediate generation. In order to explore these issues, we interviewed ten children and
teens (12–17 years of age) in Sweden who have ‘witnessed’ or been ‘exposed’ to domestic violence,
that is, they live with a parent (most notably the mother) who has been abused by the other parent or
a new partner. Early on in our inquiry, we identified spatiality and affect as significant aspects of the
children’s experiences of their grandparents’ responses. As we will expand on in this article, the inter-
viewees often made links between grandparents and home, homeliness and safety. Through focusing
on affect and place, this paper contributes to geographical literature on the home and family (Blunt
and Dowling 2006; Valentine 2008). According to Valentine (2008, 2101), geographies of families
have primarily focused ‘on the practical organization of care rather than on the emotional ties’. In
addition, little work on family relations move beyond the nuclear family and few researchers
study grandparent-grandchild relationships through a geographical lens (Vanderbeck 2007). The lit-
tle work there is, primarily focuses on grandparents and their experiences (e.g. Tarrant 2010).
Through highlighting the geographies of responses to domestic abuse, this paper also contributes
to the small, but growing, interdisciplinary childhood studies literature on children’s experiences
of violence as this literature has largely neglected spatial issues (but see Alexander et al. 2016). To
detail the spatial aspects of grandparent responses to domestic violence, we take as our starting
point the concept of ‘atmospheres’ (Anderson 2015) as it highlights the affective, relational and
material characteristics of space. We demonstrate how some grandparents help create safe atmos-
pheres in their own homes, in the homes of their abused grandchildren and in non-domestic places,
but we also show how grandparents do not always enable safe atmospheres due to relational and
spatial distance from their grandchildren.

Grandparent–grandchildren relationships in troubled times

While grandparents have increasingly become caregivers in Western societies (Attar-Schwartz and
Buchanan 2012) and are said to be able to develop stronger bonds with their grandchildren than
before (Timonen and Arber 2012), contemporary intergenerational relations are characterized by
some ambivalence. On the one hand, notions about kinship and blood ties are important for rela-
tional identities and guiding perceptions of individual rights and responsibilities, as it is often
expected that family members support and help each other, both in everyday life and in times of
trouble (Finch and Mason 1993). On the other hand, intergenerational relations are far from
given but are rather negotiated between the older and younger generations as well as by the inter-
mediate generation, which may act as gatekeepers. Other obstacles to intergenerational contact
include geographical distance (Fors and Lennartsson 2008) and grandparents having to juggle
paid work with caring for their grandchildren (Glaser et al. 2013). Adding to this ambivalence are
the contrasting cultural norms of ‘being there’ and ‘not interfering’, which have been argued to
permeate grandparenting (Mason, May, and Clarke 2007; Sandberg 2016a). Grandparents are
assumed to keep a respectful distance to their adult children but are often also expected, and expect
themselves, to be at hand when needed (Hjälm 2012). As a consequence of these contradictions,
grandparenting may be seen as being on a continuum, from fully engaging in the grandchildren
to complete withdrawal (Attias-Donfut and Segalen 2002). For instance, research shows that grand-
children are closer to maternal than paternal grandparents and closer to grandmothers than grand-
fathers (Attar-Schwartz and Buchanan 2012; Glaser et al. 2013). Moreover, grandparents’
interactions with their grandchildren are not necessarily always supportive. Older grandparents in
particular may require much care from their children, which affects the time available for the grand-
children. Grandparents may also be emotionally distant and authoritarian (Keck and Saraceno
2008).
Grandparenting literature has primarily discussed intergenerational relations in families with
‘normal’ everyday problems, such as work–family balance and childcare, but has largely neglected
 CHILDREN’S GEOGRAPHIES 3

intergenerational relations in troubled times. There is, however, a burgeoning literature on grand-
parent–grandchildren interaction in difficult circumstances, such as divorce, which suggests that
the older generation can provide security and their homes may become places where their grandchil-
dren can seek protection from adult conflict (Ferguson et al. 2004; Timonen and Doyle 2012).
Grandparents may also support sole custodial parents, or their grandchildren may move in with
them when their parents are unable to care (Timonen and Doyle 2012).
Few studies, however, explore how grandparents support children exposed to domestic violence
(Klein 2012). In a US study of grandchildren who have been cared for by their grandparents due to
difficult circumstances, including a few children exposed to domestic violence, the grandchildren
expressed appreciation for the support from the older generation (Sands, Golberg-Glenn, and
Shin 2009). In a study of grandparents in Sweden, Sandberg (2016a, 2016b) shows that they wanted
to protect their grandchildren from the violence but often had to take the intermediate generation
into consideration. The grandparents were actively trying to support their abused grandchildren
and compensate for the difficulties they had experienced, but they also felt powerless about not
being able to care enough. Similar results are found in Hughes and Emmel’s (2012) UK study of
low-income grandparents, who often experienced poverty, ill health and disabilities constraining
their possibilities to care. Both Hughes and Emmel and Sandberg point to the difficulties grandpar-
ents experienced when trying to promote independence for children and grandchildren while at the
same time providing relentless support in the face of violence.
However, grandparents were not always sure what, or how much, violence the children had been
exposed to (Sandberg 2016a, 2016b). In addition, grandparents are not necessarily supportive all the
time, but their responses may be negative and ambiguous as well. These results call for a focus on
children’s experiences of how grandparents react and behave when they become aware of the abuse.

Affect, spatiality and responses to domestic violence

Grandparent responses to domestic violence need to be understood in relation to space and place
since intergenerational interactions are always set in particular contexts and times (Vanderbeck
2007). While ‘domestic’ violence could be carried out in a number of places, the most common is
the home (Blunt and Dowling 2006). Following Blunt and Dowling (2006, 2), we see the home as
a space saturated with affect and may include ‘feelings of belonging, desire and intimacy’ as well
as ‘feelings of fear, violence and alienation’. To explore the affectivity and spatiality of grandparent
responses, we take as our starting point the concept of atmospheres, which is increasingly discussed
within human geography and non-representational theory (Anderson 2015; McCormack 2008). As
in its everyday use, atmospheres may denote moods and ambiances that, in one way or another, are
collective. These are often unacknowledged and non-representational but are nevertheless experi-
enced. We see affect as specific emotions and affective states characteristic of everyday life and as
something broader than emotions, as a body’s unique capacity to affect, and to be affected by, the
bodies and things that it encounters (Deleuze 1988). Since bodily capacities are not outside culture
but are always already mediated by their history, it is difficult to separate in practice affect and
emotions (Anderson 2015). According to Thrift (2008), affects are experienced in bodies but emerge
from diverse encounters between bodies, which may be human and non-human materialities of var-
ious kinds. They affect one another when encountering each other in space; at the same time, bodies
are affected by the place where they meet, and places are themselves accumulations of materialities.
Individuals may be pivotal in generating atmospheres, but they are dependent on human and
non-human bodies, such as the layout or the smells and objects of a place (Edensor and Sumartojo
2015). Certain places seem to evoke particular moods, and different spatial and sensorial material-
ities may act as ‘hinges’ for atmospheres while never defining once and for all the tone of a place since
they are themselves dependent on the passing human bodies (Anderson 2015). At the same time,
atmospheres are intermediate between environment and individual experience; people may therefore
discern a place differently due to their embodied histories (Ahmed 2010). In this way, materialities
4 L. GOTTZÉN AND L. SANDBERG

are central to how atmospheres emerge and transform while not determining the affective capacities
in a place.
Although not employing the concept of atmosphere, literature on children’s actions when experi-
encing domestic violence illustrates the relation between affect and space, which we attempt to cap-
ture with the term. For instance, children have different sensorial strategies in order to avoid adult
conflict, including going to another room, listening to loud music, using a comfort blanket and
focusing on something else (Alexander et al. 2016; Øverlien and Hydén 2009; Wilson, Houmøller,
and Bernays 2012). Such actions could be seen as attempts to create new atmospheres, but complete
isolation from a hostile environment is seldom possible. Wilson, Houmøller, and Bernays (2012)
suggest that domestic spaces are far from secure places of respite for children and youth exposed
to violence as they lack control of the home. Some children may access a secure, homelike environ-
ment by seeking out one elsewhere, in the homes of relatives, neighbours and friends. This strategy is,
however, limited to older children and youth, who can move more freely outside the home than
younger children (cf. Horschelmann and van Blerk 2012). In addition, when children experiencing
domestic violence are physically away from their houses, they may still be emotionally present, pre-
occupied with what is going on back home (Goldblatt 2003). This suggests that violent atmospheres
could affect at a distance and are not limited to the home. Gottzén (2017) has detailed how a male
perpetrator’s distant movement may alter a city centre’s atmosphere from that of being experienced
as safe to becoming fearful and forcing adult and child victims to search for places that offer safety.
Safety as an atmosphere calls attention to how it is produced in the encounter between an array of
human and non-human bodies, such as grandparents, grandchildren, parents and different things in
a home, and which are set between environment and individual experience. Thus, while individual
grandparents could be crucial, they are not the only agents in producing an atmosphere. Following
this, we explore atmospheres in relation to responses to domestic violence, particularly how grand-
parents do (and do not) help to create safe atmospheres for their grandchildren in their own homes,
in the children’s homes and in non-domestic places.

Method
The paper draws on a small interview study with children in Sweden about their experiences of and
perspectives on grandparents’ responses to domestic violence. The study has a purposive sample of
ten children aged 12–17 who live, or have lived, in a family with ‘moderate’ to severe physical vio-
lence against one parent. The time period of the physical violence ranges from a few months to sev-
eral years throughout childhood. All the children have at least one grandparent with whom they
interact regularly. Representativity has been a lesser concern than accessing in-depth information
about grandparent–grandchildren relationships in the face of domestic violence in the intermediate
generation. The children participate, or have participated, in support programmes for victims of
domestic abuse and are therefore used to discuss their experiences of violence. They usually come
in contact with these programmes through the abused parent, whom the police or the social services
have referred. In most cases, the perpetrator is the biological father or a stepfather who may (but not
necessarily) have been sentenced for assault or other violent crimes; sometimes the perpetrator is
attending the programme as well. In one case, the perpetrator is the mother. All the children in
this study were born in Sweden and have Swedish-born parents, except for one child whose father
is foreign born.
Although it would have been interesting to interview both grandparents and grandchildren, this
was not possible due to limited resources. Sandberg’s previous study (2016a, 2016b) complements
our findings by providing the perspectives of grandparents. Moreover, our previous research points
to ethical difficulties when interviewing people within the same network where victims of abuse and
children in particular may be vulnerable and dependent on network members for protection (Sand-
berg 2016c). Interviewing children only could from this perspective be understood as a strength as it
enabled them to produce narratives of negative and ambiguous grandparent responses.
 CHILDREN’S GEOGRAPHIES 5

In the interview, the researcher asked the child to talk about their experiences of domestic vio-
lence and then went on to ask about their grandparents’ responses and relation to the violence.
The aim was to help the child to produce detailed accounts and stories about their experiences. It
should be noted that the interview guide did not focus on spatial and affective issues, but these rather
emerged when analysing the data. The participating children responded sincerely to these questions
and provided detailed accounts of their relations to their grandparents, their grandparents’ responses
to the violence as well as their own feelings about it. All the interviews have been tape-recorded, tran-
scribed and analysed thematically. This involved familiarizing with the data, generating initial codes,
searching for themes and subsequently reviewing them and then defining and naming them, and
seeing how the data are consistent with previous research. The cases and excerpts are chosen
since they represent the emerging themes in the interviews. These themes are found under the
article’s headlines: ‘Safe atmospheres in grandparents homes’; ‘Safe atmospheres in children’s
homes’; Grandparents and safe atmospheres in non-domestic places’; ‘Grandparents not contribut-
ing to safe atmospheres’.

Grandparent responses to domestic violence

The participating children describe living with violence in terms of social isolation. This does not
mean that they did not have any friends or did not interact with relatives, but they argue that family,
friends and the authorities generally had no or little knowledge of the abuse, and few individuals in
their social networks intervened. This was often due to the exposed parent daring neither to press
charges against the perpetrator nor to communicate about the violence with friends and relatives.
If anybody knew, it was most likely a grandparent, generally the victim’s parent. The interviewees
are, however, somewhat unsure of how much their grandparents knew, and some are certain they
did not learn of the violence until very late, when the parent decided to leave the abusive relationship,
or when the police or social services intervened. No matter how much the grandparents knew about
the violence, and while their responses differed considerably, they were often important for and sup-
portive of the children in this study. The grandparents’ responses could be understood in affective-
spatial terms where they contributed to safe atmospheres, in their own homes, in the children’s
homes or in non-domestic spaces.

Safe atmospheres in grandparents’ homes

A number of grandparents opened their homes so that the children could get away from the abuse or
for respite immediately after the violent events. In such cases, the children describe their grandpar-
ents’ homes as safe. Anna (16 years of age), for instance, often went with her mother to her maternal
grandmother when there had been violence.
Anna I know grandma supported me. I could stay over at her place sometimes and played a lot there, so
grandma was probably the one I was closest to and who I really could turn to.
Lucas In which way could you turn to her?
Anna I wanted to stay with her all the time; I know I almost cried for grandma; I never wanted to stay at
home when it happened.

Her following account epitomizes many informants’ experiences of their grandparents’ homes.
It was like coming home, coming home to a wonderful home. It was like she just embraced me; it was really
reassuring to come to her, and I’d loved to stay with her several nights, but we never did. Sometimes we
slept there, sometimes we went back home, but it was, I never wanted to leave; it was always difficult to
leave her. Because it was sort of safer there than at home considering how we lived, so it felt very safe at her
place.

Anna associates her grandmother’s home with comfortable feelings and experiences of being pro-
tected. Her grandmother’s house was ‘really safe’, and it was difficult to leave and go back home,
6 L. GOTTZÉN AND L. SANDBERG

suggesting that homeliness is not necessarily tied to the place where you reside (Blunt and Dowling
2006; Wilson, Houmøller, and Bernays 2012). Her narrative is similar to that of 15-year-old Chris-
tian, who describes his maternal grandmother as ‘very involved’ and caring in the aftermath of the
violence. Together with his siblings and his mother, he went to his grandmother’s after the violent
episodes and when they finally left his stepfather. Christian’s mother also had the children stay with
their grandmother for a longer period of time.

Lucas So you were able to go to her. Do you have any memories of the feeling of leaving and coming
home when you left?
Christian Yeah, it was mostly, at that time I didn’t get what was happening, but I just felt that when going to
grandma’s, sleeping there and so on- we had a very nice time with the family without him.

Although not fully comprehending at the time the violence he was exposed to, Christian experienced
a huge difference when being away from his violent stepfather and having a ‘very nice time’ at his
grandmother’s. Both Anna’s and Christian’s narratives evoke how domestic violence challenges
ideas of the home as a place associated with protection, intimacy and feeling comfortable. Experi-
ences of ‘feeling at home’ are thus more associated with the grandmother’s house, where they feel
safe. Being able to escape to a home from home echoes the experiences of some of the interviewed
children of substance misusers (Wilson, Houmøller, and Bernays 2012), who went to the homes of
relatives, neighbours and friends to escape the violence.
Even if Christian and Anna do not detail what made the ambiance of their grandmothers’ houses
‘nice’ and ‘comfortable’, there seems to be a strong sensory aspect. Anna describes how when visiting
her grandmother, she always played with a basket filled with grandma’s necklaces while her mother
and grandmother were talking in the kitchen. This suggests how grandparents’ homes are made safe
through encounters with other bodies; in this case, adults talking (and not fighting) close by and a
child touching their grandmother’s necklaces, but it may also relate to smells, sounds and taste (see
Alexander et al. 2016; Wilson, Houmøller, and Bernays 2012). Further, when describing her experi-
ences of coming to her grandmother’s house, Anna points out that ‘she just greeted us with open
arms’, which suggests that the grandmother and her house represented an unconditional space of
protection, a space where she always felt welcome. Similar to the other children in the study, the
grandparents she experienced as supportive were those who embraced and believed her and her
abused mother. For instance, she was close to her paternal grandmother, and when Anna was
younger, she spent a lot of time with her. However, when her paternal grandmother learnt of the
violence, she ‘was always on Dad’s side’ and defended him after the abuse, whereas her maternal
grandmother cared more about how Anna felt.
Fourteen-year-old David also talked about the importance of being able to escape the violence at
home and go to a grandparent’s house. During his father’s trial, he spent time at the homes of his
maternal grandmother and aunt, who when learning of the violence were caring and supportive.
David’s paternal uncles, in contrast, blamed his mother for the violence. David underlines how
well his paternal grandmother dealt with the situation by being able to both understand her grandson
and her daughter-in-law and protect her from the uncles’ accusations. The examples of Anna and
David suggest that the affective responses of aligning with the victims are significant for grandpar-
ents’ houses to be experienced as safe. There are, however, examples of grandparents who were not
unconditionally supportive of the abused mother and the grandchildren. Christian experienced vio-
lence towards his mother from two partners. Although his maternal grandmother was supportive
and caring when his stepfather was violent and he went to stay with her during that period, her
response was negative when his mother was later abused by a new boyfriend. On learning of the vio-
lence, his grandmother sided with the boyfriend and denied the abuse. As a consequence, Christian’s
grandmother and mother stopped seeing each other, and he therefore lost contact with his grand-
mother for some time and could not seek refuge at her place. This suggests that choosing sides as
a response to violence includes both relational and spatial positions. As Ahmed (2006) has pointed
out, siding is a matter of embodied orientation; it involves an identification with each other where
 CHILDREN’S GEOGRAPHIES 7

individuals position themselves with or against each other, which affects the other bodies and their
capacities and feeling states. This siding, we argue, is central to children feeling at home; it is a form
of ‘homing device’ (Ahmed 2006, 9), an apparatus for children to find their way in their conflicted
world. Choosing sides could therefore be seen as an affective-spatial practice which includes a rela-
tional movement where grandparents side with the children and defend them and, as a consequence,
grandparents opening their homes to their grandchildren.
As demonstrated, several interviewees describe being able to escape to a grandparent who opens
their house as a very significant response. Erik, 15 years of age, details why being able to go to his
grandparents’ is a preferred response. He argues that experiences of violence do not go away immedi-
ately ‘but could stick with you for a long time’, and for this reason, it is ‘nice’ to be able to escape to
the grandparents in order ‘to think of something else’. David also emphasizes that grandparents
should let their grandchildren into their homes.
David Well, I think they’ve done great; well, the best thing is if they support you, if there’s violence at home,
then you should be able to stay there, sleep there that weekend, or they come and get you if there’s any
problems. That’s all I want and that works pretty well. The only thing that helps is to get away from
there.
Lucas Why?
David Well, it’s no fun to see it, and the more you’re involved, the angrier you get; the whole night becomes
chaotic. So if you get away or, yeah, just get away, because it’s no good if they are there when it all
happens. Then that also becomes chaotic.

Both Erik’s and David’s accounts point to how staying in the violent home perpetuates affective
states, such as aggression and frustration. Erik’s explanation that violence ‘sticks with you’ suggest
that the atmosphere of the violent home has embodied and affective consequences (cf. Ahmed
2006). Similarly, David’s elaboration that ‘it’s no fun’ to witness the violence since it makes him
angry and ‘the whole night becomes chaotic,’ points to the contagion or ‘stickiness’ of violence.
The fights between his parents, and particularly his father’s aggression and violence, could be said
to affect his bodily capacity, both in terms of what he feels and what his body can do. Thus,
while not being victim of direct physical violence, staying in such a violent atmosphere still provokes
ugly feelings as anger to ‘stick’ on him (Ahmed 2006). Negative feelings may also stick onto his
grandparents; he would rather escape his home than have his grandparents stay with him because
he believes that they will also be affected. David’s account demonstrates how relocating into the
home of the grandparents enables new configurations of bodies and accordingly different atmos-
pheres, characterized by safety, peace and support instead of chaos and anger.
However, far from all the grandparents contributed to such safe atmospheres in their homes;
rather, they could become violent. Irma, 13 years of age, narrates how the last time she was at her
paternal grandparents’, her grandfather got drunk, aggressive and verbally abused her mother. In
addition, when learning of the father’s violence, her paternal grandparents only believed him,
who denounced and played down his abuse. As a consequence, Irma and her mother have not sought
further support from them. This suggests that if grandparents’ homes are to be safe both in the most
immediate material sense as well as emotionally, it is important that they need to be loyal to and side
with the children. Similarly, David’s account of the anger and chaos that persist if children stay at
home suggests that while the children’s homes may be emotionally messy spaces, grandparents’
homes may, in contrast, potentially be calm and comforting. Creating these safe atmospheres,
steeped in intimacy and loyalty, was perceived as a more significant response than actually interven-
ing or talking about the violence with the children, something that will be detailed in the following.

Safe atmospheres in children’s homes

Grandparents’ opening their homes to their grandchildren was not the only way safe atmospheres
were created. Grandparents also came to their grandchildren’s homes and through their embodied
presence contributed to safety and tranquillity. Beatrice, 15 years of age, lived next door to her
8 L. GOTTZÉN AND L. SANDBERG

maternal grandfather, who was heavily involved in their everyday lives, supporting them financially,
practically and emotionally. Both when her stepfather abused her mother and when her mother
became aggressive, Beatrice would ask her grandfather to come over.
He came; it wasn’t only the violence [i.e. the stepfather’s]; Mum also had some psychological issues. In the eve-
ning, she could sort of have outbursts; she could throw stuff and scream, so we got worried, and then we called
grandpa right away, and then he came and tried to calm Mum down. He calmed us kids down.

The grandfather’s presence and ability to calm the situation down increased the sense of safety and
comfort for Beatrice and her siblings. But the safe atmosphere that he created is seemingly not only
connected to his bodily presence immediately after the violent episodes but just as much a result of
his long-term and continuous everyday presence in their home. Beatrice describes how he used to
come over for coffee, help them with their homework and play with them; he also paid for school
trips and bought them new clothes. This, together with coming to their rescue, created a sense of
being emotionally and spatially at hand and contributed to a safe atmosphere, which is more impor-
tant for Beatrice than talking with him about the violence.
I haven’t talked with grandpa about it, or about everything that happened then; it was enough with- he saw what
was going on. He came over after a big fight or if anything had happened. It was enough that he came and sort
of saw that we weren’t alright. And a hug was enough. It’s always been like that; grandpa has always wanted us
to be alright, to turn out alright. So in a way it’s like you really don’t need to talk with him about all those years,
but it’s enough to know that he wants us to be okay, and we are today thanks to his support.

Note how safety and comfort are sensorially and corporeally produced here as a result of her grand-
father coming over, seeing the children, acknowledging how they are doing and hugging them. His
social and emotional support make Beatrice see him ‘almost like a dad’, and she, her siblings, her
mother and her grandfather formed ‘a small family’. By caring for them, creating calm and safety
and, as Beatrice puts it, ‘actually seeing them’, the grandfather is considered a part of her immediate
family. She contrasts her grandfather’s responses with those of her biological father, who lived in
another city and knew of what was going on but still did nothing. While portraying her grandfather
as a ‘dad’, her relationship with her biological father is described as more distant, at least in relation
to the violence. Creating safe atmospheres in the homes of violence-exposed children may thus not
only become a way of responding to violence but also be a matter of ‘doing family’, where the
capacity to care and take responsibility, rather than the kinship position, defines family.
As Beatrice’s grandfather lived close to her during the period when she was exposed to violence, it
may seem straightforward to think of geographical proximity as a crucial factor when creating safety
(cf. Hjälm 2012). Beatrice, however, points out that her paternal grandmother and her aunt also lived
close by, and although she had stayed with them a lot as a child and they knew what was going on at
home, they still failed to contribute to her safety since they ignored and minimized the violence.
Similarly, care and support do not necessarily require geographical proximity but could be carried
out at a greater distance (Milligan and Wiles 2010). For instance, Beatrice later moved to another
part of the country, far away from her grandfather, but she still sees him as intimate and argues
that they have ‘the same bond now as before really’.

Grandparents and safe atmospheres in non-domestic places

Creating safe and homely atmospheres, either in children’s houses or in grandparents’ homes, could,
as we have discussed, be significant for children in order for them to gain increased security and con-
trol over their homes, which is often made difficult by domestic violence (see Alexander et al. 2016;
Wilson, Houmøller, and Bernays 2012). At times, the grandparents brought their grandchildren into
their own social worlds outside the home and in that way contributed to a sense of ‘normality’ and
safety. Jenny (17 years of age), for instance, stayed for periods of time with her grandmother in
another city in order to get respite from the violence. They spent time at home, but her grandmother
also got her to join different social activities, which she remembers as warm occasions since she was
 CHILDREN’S GEOGRAPHIES 9

welcomed and taken care of by her grandmother’s friends. However, sometimes domestic violence
may be so severe that the grandparents’ homes and social worlds are also impossible to keep safe.
This was the case for 15-year-old Gina. Her stepfather’s violence towards her mother culminated
in Gina, her two siblings and their mother escaping to their maternal grandmother for the night.
The next day, the grandmother drove them to a women’s shelter in the city as her house was not
safe enough.
Gina Uh, grandma and I, she’s played a big role in what happened during the violence. Because we were
going to her when we heard that the man was in jail or was in prison, and then we went home to
her and stayed the night there, but then I wasn’t allowed to.
Lucas Why not?
Gina No, we had to go to a safe house in case anything happened; so we had to go to the women’s shelter,
and she drove us there. She lived close by, so she came with food and visited us a lot, and we also
visited them.

The response of Gina’s grandmother could be understood as a way of creating a safe space in non-
domestic places when domestic violence disrupts the home as a possible place of refuge. Similar to
Beatrice’s grandfather, whose everyday presence in the violent home came to represent the ‘normal’
life, Gina’s grandmother, by bringing food, became a link to the everyday world outside. In our small
study, Gina was the only participant who had to relocate to a women’s shelter, but her experiences
suggest, however, that safe atmospheres emerging from grandparents’ responses are not necessarily
simply tied to domestic spaces but may be produced in other locations too. Although considered safe,
she also describes the women’s shelter as a lonely and rather scary place. The grandmother’s visits
became breaks in their isolation; her bodily encounter with the safe house thus enabled new affective
possibilities because a sense of ‘feeling at home’ was created. The need to create not only safety but
also spaces of homeliness may be a crucial way to support children, and bringing food and visiting
could thus contribute to the ambiance of a place (cf. Gottzén 2017).

Grandparents not contributing to safe atmospheres

Though the grandparents were generally close and important persons in the children’s lives and
cared and supported them during the violent situations, many grandparents were not perceived
as caring and supportive but as failing to provide safe atmospheres. In some cases, grandparents
were due to geographical distance unable to provide safety for the children during or after their
exposure to violence. This is evident with Erik, 15 years of age, whose father abused his mother
during one summer. Erik says that ‘suddenly one day’ his father came home and was ‘aggressive
and violent’, a violence that escalated rapidly. Erik lived only a few streets away from his maternal
grandfather, and they have always had a close relationship and spent a lot of time together. Erik’s
grandfather had, however, gone sailing during that summer and was therefore not available as a
potential source of refuge or support. But also when coming back home, his grandfather did not
intervene as he was reluctant to believe that Erik’s father had been abusive: ‘Grandpa didn’t really
believe what happened, I mean, when he was sentenced. Because Dad is always able to talk, manip-
ulate people’. Another reason for failing to provide safety was the infirmity and frailty of some grand-
parents. Seventeen-year-old Hampus has a close relationship with his paternal grandmother; she has
always lived nearby the family, and at the time of the interview she was living with them. Even
though the relationship with her is depicted in positive terms and she has always lived close by,
her old age and failing health meant that she was not somebody whom Hampus, his siblings and
abused father counted on. They did not therefore communicate with her about the abuse.
Finally, some grandparents did not contribute to safe atmospheres because they were emotionally
distant, which we have discussed above, but it is particularly clear in the case of 12-year-old Filippa,
who perceives all her grandparents as having taken her abusive father’s side. Her paternal grandmother
treats her father like her ‘little baby boy’, she argues, and excuses all his behaviour. Her relationship
with her paternal grandmother has always been emotionally distant; she has never been able to go
10 L. GOTTZÉN AND L. SANDBERG

to her or contact her: ‘I’ve never really been able to call, ‘cause then I’ve been a nuisance’. In contrast,
Filippa has had an ‘all-right’ relationship with her maternal grandparents, who live nearby, but in the
case of her father’s abuse, she feels that they have turned against her mother. Filippa is particularly
disappointed that they have not dared to criticize her father and have maintained contact with him.
In addition, there is a history of blaming the mother for ‘many things’. As a consequence of their nega-
tive sentiments towards her mother, the maternal grandparents do not care about Filippa either, she
feels. Thus, here the grandparents do not contribute to a safe atmosphere due to their affective distance
and their turning against the mother (cf. Ahmed 2006). This also points to how experiences of past
intergenerational violence and abuse may affect whether homes of grandparents were presently
experienced as safe atmospheres. None of the children in this study elaborated on their grandparents
as victims or perpetrators of domestic violence, However, the intergenerational transmission of dom-
estic violence has received significant attention in the literature (cf. Widom and Wilson 2015) and
Sandberg’s (2016a, 2016b) study indicates that grandmothers supporting victimized daughters and
grandchildren commonly had own experiences of domestic violence that shaped their responses,
either in terms of being unable to help or being more prompt to intervene.
Fillipa’s story tells of how responses in troubled times are shaped by previous affective distance,
but there are also examples of close grandparent–grandchild relationships being disrupted by dom-
estic violence. Erik, for instance, used to stay with his paternal grandparents for entire weekends and
characterizes their overall relationship as good in the past. However, because they refused to believe
that his father had been violent (‘they only believe Dad’), he does not see them anymore. Other cases
were more ambivalent, like Anna, who says that she has a really close relationship with her paternal
grandmother.
She has always been really caring about me and how I feel; she told me how much she missed me when she
moved, and we were always there when I was little, so we are still really close.

Given Anna’s description of her close relationship with her paternal grandmother, one may assume
that she has also been supportive and someone to confide in after her father’s abuse, but Anna says
that her grandmother has always defended her dad and ‘was against my mum’. The children’s nar-
ratives about their grandparents who did not contribute to a safe atmosphere could be understood in
terms of affective distance. Similar to how the grandparents’ enabling of safe atmospheres was closely
linked to making the children feel trusted, the grandparents who failed to do so were clearly per-
ceived by our informants as siding with the abuser rather than with the victim and their children.

Concluding discussion
Our results echo some of the findings from Sandberg’s previous research with grandparents (2016a,
2016b), where they described themselves as attempting to provide care and support to their grand-
children experiencing domestic violence. Our study presents a rather complex picture of children
being supported by some grandparents but also being let down by others. Some grandparents –
usually the victim’s mother – were at hand and contributed to providing safe atmospheres in
their own homes, in the children’s homes or in non-domestic places. However, many grandparents
did not contribute to a sense of safety for their grandchildren and in some cases even aggravated the
vulnerability by not trusting the child’s and the victim’s stories about the abuse.
Åkerlund (2017) has shown that children may be reluctant to talk about their violence exposure,
even with brothers or sisters who have lived in the same violent home. Instead, it was more impor-
tant that others cared for and supported them during and after the violence. Similarly, our results
suggest that what the children perceived as favourable responses had affective rather than primarily
discursive characteristics. The central themes in the children’s stories were not the ability to talk with
their grandparents about the abuse, but that they came to their house when called upon, opened their
homes or cared for them. Care was thus primarily a practical matter for the children rather than
being able to communicate about difficult issues with the older generation.
 CHILDREN’S GEOGRAPHIES 11

Since grandparents’ houses are places away from the violent home, they may seem as safe
havens for exposed grandchildren. However, following Anderson (2015), we argue that places
are potentially, but not intrinsically, safe; they are made safe by an assemblage of different
human and non-human bodies encountering each other in the particular place. That grandpar-
ents’ homes are considered safer than children’s should be seen as a result of the relationships
between the bodies present in these locales. While violent and aggressive affective states tended
to dominate the atmospheres in the children’s houses, these were not present in the grandparents’,
largely due to the absence of the perpetrator. However, an atmosphere may temporarily change
when coming across new bodies or atmospheres (Anderson 2015). Through their encounters
with other bodies, for example by embracing a grandchild when arriving, grandparents contrib-
uted to creating temporary safety also in homes disrupted by violence. This suggests that the affec-
tivity of the home (Blunt and Dowling 2006), is not stable but that its atmosphere may alter when
encountering new human and non-human bodies. Yet, as David pointed out, when grandparents
come to the violent home, they risk being affected by the aggressive ambiance. When they
encounter the bodies in the violent home, they may be unable to prevail over the dominating
atmosphere but rather are ‘seized’ by it.
An issue closely related to the affective potentiality of different places and how safety is created
is that a spatial movement to create safety, that is, grandchildren going to their grandparents or
vice versa, does not seem enough; instead, this movement has to correspond to a relational move-
ment where grandparents believe and side with their grandchildren. This confirms Valentine’s
(2008) argument that intergenerational relations are characterized by affective ties rather than
simply being a matter of practical organization of care, and that spatiality and affect are intimately
connected in responses to domestic violence. For the participants in this study, siding with the
grandchildren includes believing the victims and their stories rather than the perpetrators’ ver-
sions. In order to create a safe atmosphere, grandparents therefore need to align with their grand-
children and the victims. As Ahmed (2006) has argued, aligning may create a sense of belonging
and coherence that are necessary to guide our lives. This may be particularly important for chil-
dren whose lives and homes have been disrupted by violence. By siding with the victims, grand-
parents may not only help their grandchildren orient in their disoriented and messy worlds but
also contribute to safety, comfort, and ‘feeling at home’ in times of trouble when safety is hard to
find

Acknowledgements
We thank the anonymous reviewers, Karin Aronsson and our colleagues at the Department of Child and Youth
Studies, Stockholm University, for their incisive comments on earlier drafts of the paper. We are most grateful to
the participating children.

Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Funding
The study ‘Grandparents’ responses to intimate partner violence: Children’s experiences and perspectives’ was
financed by the Children’s Welfare Foundation Sweden (FB13-0029). It has been approved by the Regional Ethical
Review Board in Stockholm (ref. no. 2014-1362).

ORCID
Lucas Gottzén http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3605-8664
12 L. GOTTZÉN AND L. SANDBERG

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