MODERN WESTERN IDEA OF CHILDHOOD
HISTORICAL DIFFERENCES IN CHILDHOOD
PHILLIP ARIES
ARIES (CHILDHOOD CHANGE)
HAS POSITION OF CHILDREN IMPROVED?
CHILD LIBERATIONISTS - ADULTS AND CHILDREN
Child liberationists see the need to free children from adult control. Adult control takes number of forms:
AGE PATRIARCHY
GITTINS - used the term to describe inequalities between adults ad children. There is an age patriarchy of adult domination that keep children subordinate e.g. they exercise control over children's time and bodies and child laws which prevent children from working allows children to stay economically dependent
CATHY HUMPHREYS AND RACI THIARA - a quarter of the 200 women in their study left their abusing partner because they feared for their children - which supports Gittins' view that patriarchy oppresses children as well as women
RESISTANCE - children may resist restricted status of child by acting older e.g. by smoking, drinking etc. HOCKEY AND JAMES say this shows children want to escape modern childhood
CHILDHOOD - THE FUTURE OF CHILDHOOD
THE DISAPPEARANCE OF CHILDHOOD
POSTMAN - argues childhood as we know it is disappearing and children are becoming more like adults - gaining similar rights and acting in similar ways. He blames this on television culture replacing print culture
OPIE (CRITICISM)
TOXIC CHILDHOOD
CHANGE OR CONTINUITY?
Whether childhood is changing, disappearing or continuing depends on what happens to:
- JANE PILCHER - most important feature of childhood is separateness, child hood seen as distinct life stage shown through:
- Different laws regulating what children can or can't do
- Differences in dress
- Product services esp for children
- Idea of childhood as 'golden age' children seen as vulnerable and in need of protection from adult world
- separate age-status not found in all societies - STEPHEN WAGG because childhood is socially constructed, not universal experience
- WAGG,
- ARIES
- WILLMOT AND YOUNG
- Childhood defined by society with minimum ages and policies like child act - African children do not have as much of childhood as they contribute to income
- in middle ages childhood didn't exist and children were mini adults
- Concept of childhood has changed - child-centered
- PARSONS
- COCKETT AND TRIPP
- MURRAY
- HASLEY
- Children are passive - seen not heard
- Children of divorces suffer from low self-esteem, problems in education, health and anti-social behaviour
- Children of single parents running wild
- Children of single parents die younger
- QURTROP
- POSTMAN
- childhood disappearing there are more old people than young due to falling birth rate
- Childhood disappearing, children wearing more grown up clothes
- OPIE - argues childhood not disappearing based on research into games, rhymes and songs of children's culture
- PALMER
- DENZIN
- TOXIC CHILDHOOD - rapid technological and cultural changes over past 25 years - children consume in: junk food, computer games, intensive marketing, educational testing
- UK's children socialized more by TV than parents
HISTORICAL DIFFERENCES IN CHILDHOOD
PHILLIP ARIES
- argued that in pre-industrial society, children were ' little adults' taking on adult responsibility. Children would be expected to help out in the household as young as 7 and 8 - households unit of production
- In eyes of law children could be seen as criminally responsible at age of 7 and 8.
- argued two factors why society did not regard children as objects of love and devotion:
- High infant mortality rate
- Life very 'hand to mouth' children had to work for unit to survive
ARIES (CHILDHOOD CHANGE)
- Little adults view remained up until 19th century - children freq being employed to work in mines and factories
- 19th vent - infant mortality began to decrease due to improvement in health and diet
- MC started to change whereas WC tended to still view children as adults because they needed their income for survival
- Lower infant mortality rates and smaller families - more infants shriving meant that parents had fewer children and made a greater financial and emotional investment in them
- Specialist knowledge about children's health e.g. theories of child development stressed that children need supervision and protection
- Laws banning child labour from the 1940s onwards changed children from economic assets to economic liabilities, financially dependent on their parents
- Compulsory schooling since 1880 has created a period of dependency on the family and seperated children from adult world of work
- Children protection and welfare laws and agencies emphasised children's vulnerability and made their welfare and central concern
- The idea of children's rights e.g. the Children Act (1989) sees parents as having responsibilities towards their children rather than rights
- Laws about social behaviour e.g. minimum ages for a wide range of activities, from sex to smoking, reinforce the attitude that children are different from adults
HAS POSITION OF CHILDREN IMPROVED?
- Mop argues that the position of children in western societies has been steadily improving and today is better than it has ever been
- Aries and shorter hold 'march of progress' view. They argue that today's children are more valued, better cared for, protected and educated, enjoy better health and have more rights
- Children today are protected from harm and exploitation by laws against child abuse and child labour, the family has become child-centered, with parents investing a great deal in their children emotionally as well as financially
- Conflict sociologists argue that the 'march of progress' view f modern childhood is based on false and idealised image that ignores important inequalities - criticised on two grounds
- There are inequalities among children in terms of opportunities and risks they face
- Inequalities between children and adults are greater than ever
- Nationality differences:. 90% of the world's low birth-weight babies are born in the 3rd world
- Gender differences between children - boys are more likely to be allowed to cross or cycle on roads, use buses, go out after dark etc
- Ethnic differences: study of 15-16 years olds found Asian parents more likely than other parents to be strict towards their daughters
- Class differences: poor mothers more likely to have low birth-weight babies which may delay physical and intellectual development
CHILD LIBERATIONISTS - ADULTS AND CHILDREN
Child liberationists see the need to free children from adult control. Adult control takes number of forms:
- Neglect and abuse
- Controls over children's space - children told to play in some areas and are forbidden in others
- Controls over children's time - adults in modern societies control children's daily routines, including when they get up, eat, go to school, to bed etc
- Control over children's bodies - how they sit, walk, run and what they wear etc
AGE PATRIARCHY
GITTINS - used the term to describe inequalities between adults ad children. There is an age patriarchy of adult domination that keep children subordinate e.g. they exercise control over children's time and bodies and child laws which prevent children from working allows children to stay economically dependent
CATHY HUMPHREYS AND RACI THIARA - a quarter of the 200 women in their study left their abusing partner because they feared for their children - which supports Gittins' view that patriarchy oppresses children as well as women
RESISTANCE - children may resist restricted status of child by acting older e.g. by smoking, drinking etc. HOCKEY AND JAMES say this shows children want to escape modern childhood
CHILDHOOD - THE FUTURE OF CHILDHOOD
THE DISAPPEARANCE OF CHILDHOOD
POSTMAN - argues childhood as we know it is disappearing and children are becoming more like adults - gaining similar rights and acting in similar ways. He blames this on television culture replacing print culture
- In print culture children lacked literacy skills needed to access information and therefore knowledge about sex, money, violence, illness, death and other 'adult' themes could be kept secret from them
- Television culture makes information available to adults and children alike. The boundary between adulthood and childhood is broken down and authority is weakened
OPIE (CRITICISM)
- argues that childhood is not disappearing. Based on lifetime of research into children's games, rhymes and songs she argues that there is strong evidence of the continued existence of a separate children's culture
- These findings contradict Postman's claim that children's own unsupervised games are dying out and that western childhood is not disappearing, but rather spreading
TOXIC CHILDHOOD
- PALMER - argues that rapid technological and cultural changes are damaging to children's development e.g. junk food, computer games, intensive marketing to children, testing in education, long hours worked by parents and as a result children are deprived of a genuine childhood
- JULIE MARGO AND MIKE DIXON - report that UK youth are near the top of the international league tables for obesity, self-harm, drug and alcohol abuse, violence, early sexual experience and teen pregnancies
- UNICEF ranked UK 21.25 for children's well being
CHANGE OR CONTINUITY?
Whether childhood is changing, disappearing or continuing depends on what happens to:
- Emphasis on children's rights
- Length of time in education
- Children's access to communication
- Growing similarities between children and adults
- Adult concerns about children's behaviour