Assess Sociological Explanations of Changes in the Status of Childhood

A description of the social, economical and cultural factors that will impact on the lives of children and young people.

There is little evidence of what it was really like in the past so it is difficult for a lot of people to re-construct the life of a child, however from what I have researched, and in my own opinion I am going to summarise the historical changes in childhood experience and relate these changes to childhood development and rights.

Childhood itself is a slightly ambiguous term, and is not a fixed definite period of life. The book “AS level sociology” written by Rob webb, Hal Westergaard, Kieth Trobe and Liz Steel defines childhood as “ a socially defined age status” going on to say that there are major differences in how childhood is defined, both historically, and culturally, similarly, Stephen Wagg says of childhood;

Environment: Socialisation is important for children. Parents who offer their children varied opportunities in which to meet new people and experience new things give their children an invaluable gift. When they are babies, children need no more than the attentive, loving care given by their parents, but as they grow, it is beneficial for children to expand their worlds by making friends with other people and learning about different cultures. Children who gain a sense of confidence in their ability to interact with people will take them into adulthood making both their personal and professional lives

Childhood is a social construct that has been weaved together by societal norms and domineering perspectives. Childhood is not a physical or mental state but an abstraction that has been melded by society as time has progressed. In Karen Sanchez-Eppler’s excerpt titled “Childhood” from the novel Keywords for Children’s Literature, she explains how the attitudes and atmosphere surrounding childhood have vastly changed throughout history to yield the general, modern conception of childhood. Children have been deemed adults in the Middle Ages and childhood has been a vaguely regarded concept. However, as society has become more progressive and developed, an interest in distinguishing the young from the older individuals

Childhood was not considered a special time for development but rather a hurdle on the way to adulthood. “The goal was to get children speaking, reading, reasoning, and contributing to their family’s economic well-being as quickly as possible.”(Mintz 50) Many kids as young as six were working outside of the home at the time. A cultural revolution began in the eighteenth century when many middle class parents began to relish in their children’s innocence and saw this a time to nurture mold their children. As this form of parenting became the norm many parents began to have less children by using birth control, thus giving the fewer children they had more of their attention. As time progressed kids spent more time going to school rather than to work. “Within the last 3 centuries “Societal views about methods of Child rearing, the nature of children’s play, the ideal duration of schooling, the participation of young people in work, and the demarcation points between childhood, adolescence, and adulthood have shifted significantly.”(Mintz

| Conflict sociologists, such as Marxist and feminists, argue that society is based on conflict between different social groups such as classes and genders. They say that there are inequalities among children in terms of their opportunities and risks, and that many children are unprotected and badly cared for.

One of the main features of childhood studies is the idea that childhood is socially constructed. This means that not all childhoods are the same and that it may differ depending on the time in which it is taking place, as well as the social environment or the place that it is taking place. This can be seen at the Museum of Childhood, and how different times have shown changes in the way children act, play, dress, or ultimately are treated in society. Additionally it draws on key differences in the human societies affecting different childhoods in any given period or place, and can examine how the childhood in that given period is constructed. Furthermore a social constructionist looks at the consequences of any given factor and the impact it has on children.

The concept of childhood, is not a natural state, but it has been socially constructed through society and can only exist in a society that understand the term this has been reinforced through history. Another issue is how much of ‘childhood’ has been socially constructed (created and

Childhood is the age span ranging from birth to adolescence and its non-specific for it can imply a varying range of years in human development reference. The age ranges anywhere from 12 years to 15years with 18years being most common. Previous research done by sociologists focused on children primarily in terms of socialization and within the context of the family. The ‘new sociology of childhood’ argues that children inhabit more than one world, worlds that may well conflict those of adults, those of children 's own making, and those that children

Childhood has its own ways of seeing, thinking, and feeling which are proper to it/ child’s mind considered as a blank state to be inscribed by experience: the infant is often compared to a ‘white paper’ to be written over or to a plastic substance (wax) to be molded

Childhood as disappearing/not disappearing will be discussed within this essay. There is no universal definition for childhood however in the western culture childhood is a period of dependency, characterised by learning the norms and values of society, innocence and freedom from responsibilities. Sociologists such as Postman and Jenks would argue that childhood is disappearing however Opie and Opie and Palmer would contradict this.

To conclude, Western societies have a societal structure in which the individual who is at the top of the organisation receive greater respect from those who are below him. Similarly, in a westernised society, the parents would be the one at the top of the structure and the children would be below them. Hence, this notion creates a conflict between the children’s individual autonomy and the social structure as the children’s freedom of speech and action are being ‘violated’ and not paid respect to when the parent is constantly the decision maker. In contrast, Lee illustrates that in order to resolve this conflict, many Aboriginal, Sikh and Burma societies approach child-rearing in a different manner. In those societies, individual autonomy is shaped by the cultural framework, the individual integrity of the child as well as the parent is respected by one another and the idea of self-governance provides freedom to everyone. Finally, in an attempt to reconcile this conflict, child-rearing in the societies explored by Lee,

Starting with an overview of social constructionism in very general terms leads to build more explicit an understanding of child and childhood in a social world. The notion of social constructionism is defined in diverse disciplines and instead of generating a single description there are a number of thoughts. “It is sometimes called a movement, at other times a position, a theory, a theoretical orientation, an approach; psychologists remain unsure of its status” (Stam 2001, p. 294)”. Vivien (1995, p. 10) points out that the origin of social constructionism stems from two to three hundred years ago in the period of enlightenment, modernism and postmodernism. Berger and Luckmann’ (1966) book The Social Construction of Reality as the first book to have the title of “social construction”, has made an influential contribution in recent studies (Hacking, 1999). In this book, questioning everyday life realities and giving examples from it, shows the importance of social relations and the language that we used. Hacking’s (1999) The Social Construction of What? offers up-to-date and logical instances which enable us to comprehend these aspects. He lists a number of things that can be

It is generally reported that the definition of child categorizes a group of people according to age as in Convention Article 1 declared: For the purposes of the present Convention, a child means every human being below the age of 18 years unless under the law applicable to the child majority is attained earlier. However, UNICEF answered question of age range by saying there are some circumstances which can change benchmark ages namely the age for admission into employment, obligatory education. In other words according to countries age range is changeable and it can be varying. The question of those variations evokes the socially constructed of child and childhood. First time Ariés (1962) illuminated childhood in the context of social construction with his research from the Middle Ages onwards (James & James 2004). At beginning of his book he exemplified this by asking the age of one child can be answered easily but other child in the African bush does not know their age as a tangible concept. It has