Congratulations to the new doctor Akvilė Giniotaitė on successfully defending her doctoral dissertation “Non-Silent Dimensions of Sexuality Education in Adult Narratives” (Education Sciences  (S 007)) and  aquiring   doctoral deegree  in the field of Social Sciences, Education. Scientific supervisor of the thesis is prof. dr. Lilija Duoblienė (Vilnius University, Social Sciences, Educaton Sciences –S 007).

The dissertation is available at:

https://is.vu.lt/pls/pub/ivykiai.ivykiai_prd?p_name=802A2522FCE9120992DC9CBA21651352/G…

A short  annotation of the dissertation is presented below.

The dissertation explores adults’ experiences of talking about sexuality with young people and with each other, in order to understand how adults (parents, carers, teachers) experience sexuality education conversations and what aspects of these conversations they and they bring to the forefront of their stories. The work is based on a posthumanist approach, discussing the categories of gender and age as significant factors in the construction of a ‘proper’ sexual subject. The theory of the child as insufficiently mature to embrace sexual knowledge is also explored. The theoretical part also discusses the different conceptions of sexuality education, the content of sexuality education, and presents the situation of sexuality education in Lithuania. In the empirical part, a dialogical narrative analysis was used, 23 adult interviews were analysed. In the analysis, the narratives were grouped into 4 dimensions: youth experiences, themes, process and states of conversation between adults. In the dimension of youthful experiences, the feelings of lack and abandonment and the need to reflect on one’s own experience of sexuality education emerged. Some participants, although holding different ideological positions on the issue of sexuality education, had similar views on some aspects, indicating an untapped opportunity for dialogue between adults. The silence between adults is seen as a gap in the provision of quality sexuality education for young people. The dissertation makes recommendations for parents, educators and educational policy makers.

Dissertation Defence Board

Chairperson – assoc. prof. dr. Irena Stonkuvienė (Vilnius University, Social Sciences, Education – S 007),
Prof. dr. Dovilė Budrytė (Georgia Gwinnett College, Social Sciences, Political Science – S 002),
Prof. dr. Natalija Mažeikienė (Vytautas Magnus University, Social Sciences, Education – S 007),
Prof. dr. Odeta Merfeldaitė (Mykolas Romeris University, Social Sciences, Education – S 007),
Prof. dr. Paulius Skruibis (Vilnius University, Social Sciences, Psychology – S 006).