Anthropology and Child Development
A Cross-Cultural Reader
Blackwell Anthologies in Social and Cultural Anthropology
1. Edition January 2008
334 Pages, Softcover
Wiley & Sons Ltd
This unprecedented collection of articles is an introduction to the
study of cultural variations in childhood across the world and to
the theoretical frameworks for investigating and interpreting
them.
* Presents a history of cross-cultural approaches to
child-development
* Recent articles examine diverse contexts of childhood in
ecological, semiotic, and sociolinguistic terms
* Includes ethnographic studies of childhood in the Pacific,
Africa, Latin America, East Asia, Europe and North America
* Illuminates the process through which people become the bearers
of culturally/historically specific identities
* Serves as an ideal text for anthropology courses focusing on
childhood, as well as classes on development psychology
Introduction: Robert A. LeVine and Rebecca S. New.
Part I: Discovering Diversity in Childhood: Early Works.
Part II: Infant Care: Cultural Variation in Parental Goals and Practices.
Part III: Early Childhood: Language Acquisition, Socialization and Enculturation.
Part IV: Middle and Later Childhood: Work, Play, Participation, Learning.
Epilogue.
Index
development that draws upon anthropology's unique ability to hone
in on both the extraordinary complex phenomenon of individual
childhood agency and the social constructions ilia1 lend 1.0 bind
and limit our notions of children as social actors." (Journal of
Anthropological Research, 2010)
"Not unexpectedly, LeVine and New - true scholars
- have rendered a reader, a reference, and a stunningly
prescient volume that should be savored and studied, not merely
read. Of sweeping breadth across time and place and of unparalleled
depth regarding the nature of children and childhood, Anthropology
and Child Development challenges deeply held conventions while
provoking invigorating ways of thinking and acting - an
indispensable, intellectual compass for globalists, futurists, and
all who care about children."
Sharon Lynn Kagan, Columbia University
"The cutting-edge scholarship presented in this important
and timely book richly documents that the nuances of cultural
context constitute a fundamental basis for significant variation in
the development of diverse children and adolescents."
Richard Lerner, Tufts University"This is an artfully
organized collection of seminal papers, a collection that pulls
together research across stages of childhood; domains (of the
development of emotion, thought, and language); theories; methods;
and, of course, cultures. The collection also provides a sense of
the historical development of the field, as a chronological reading
of the papers, from a Boas essay published in 1911 to several
papers published in the new millennium, reveals the changing
concerns, concepts, and theories that have characterized work on
culture and child development over the past 100 years."
Joseph Tobin, Arizona State University
Rebecca S. New is associate professor of education and research fellow at the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. She has spent three decades studying the cultural nature of child development and early education, most often in Italy and recently in Head Start programs serving immigrant populations. Publications include the four-volume Early Childhood Education: An International Encyclopedia (2007).