Perspectives of Childhood
Introduction
Childhood can be conceptualized as one of the several stages that human beings pass through in their journey to adulthood. It is regarded as one of the most innocent and free phases in human development. The individual has not yet learned the ways of the world, and as such, they are “pure” or “unspoiled” by the world. It is also highly regarded for it is the most important phase in human development. The character of the human being, which will guide them through the world in their adulthood, is formed at this stage. Developments at childhood will determine the direction that the life of the individual will follow, for character traits adopted at childhood are hard to shed in later years.
A lot of studies have been dedicated to this stage of human development. These studies emanate from a wide range of academic fields, given that it is hard to constrict childhood studies into one particular discipline. The academic fields include, among others, sociology, psychology, education, philosophy, and theology (Mills & Mills 2000).
In their book Childhood Studies: A Reader in Perspectives of Childhood, Jean Mills and Richard Mills identify several perspectives of childhood that are adopted in contemporary society (pages nine to thirty-one). Some of these perspectives are adopted by specific fields while others are multi-disciplinary, cutting across disciplines. They reflect values that are associated with children in society and the corresponding treatment that they are availed of. The perspectives have riding characteristics that they ascribe to children also.
Perspective one: Children as Innocent
Before looking at how Mills and Mills (2000 1-10, 200-210) conceptualize innocence in children, it will be to look at the various definitions that are available as to what innocence is. With this definition, it will be easy to contextualize these authors’ views.
Goldstein (2009) defines innocence as the aspect of being uncorrupted by evil, “malice or wrongdoing” (1). In other words, innocence is the absence of sins or what society takes to be evil. It can also be taken as meaning the opposite of being guilty, free from guilty. In this context, we can see that when children are described as being innocent, they are in effect displayed as entities that are free from evil, that is not guilty of wrongdoing, and unspoiled by the world.
Dickinson, as cited in Mills and Mills (2000 10) is of the view that children are angels in disguise. In other words, they are as pure and as free of sin as the angels. One character that is associated with this perspective, and which makes children appear innocent, is the fact they have not yet sinned, neither do they have the capability to do so. From a theological point of view, they are good because they are God’s creations, untainted by worldly evil. God, according to Mills and Mills (2000 9), makes all things good. It is man’s meddling with God’s handiwork that makes them become evil (Mills & Mills 2000 10). Since a child has not yet been meddled with by the human element, they can be assumed to be innocent, for they have a “good” trait by the respect of them being God’s creation.
Perspective two: Children as Apprentices
Mills and Mills (2000 9) conceptualize apprenticeship as the aspect of learning a new trade, the process of acquiring new skills and qualifications to handle a defined task in the future. Children are apprentices, as they are still learning the skills of the human trade, the skills necessary to enable them to handle adulthood duties. They are learning, among others, social skills necessary for them to operate as full-fledged human beings in society (Mills & Mills 2000 8).
A character that is associated with this perspective is the fact that children are learners. They are subjects of either formal or informal education system where they are instilled with traits that are needed in adulthood. The education system socialises and “encultures” them, making sure that they absorb from the society the social and other attributes crucial for survival in that particular society.
Perspective 3: Children as Persons in their Own Right
Childhood, remarks Goldstein (2009 1), is a unique stage in one’s development. A person is both “being” and “becoming” at this stage (Goldstein 2009 1). They are becoming because this is a transitional stage to adulthood. They are “being” because the child is a unique, complete individual. Despite the fact that they are on the state of becoming adults, or what Mills and Mills (2000 4) terms as “emergent adults”, they also have individual features and integrity that makes them human beings or persons in their own right.
One character that makes them persons in their own right is the fact that they “can and do act as perfectly competent social beings” (Mills & Mills 2000 9) within settings that are both familiar and acceptable to their perceptions. This is no different from adults, who also possess this trait. Children are also different from each other. It is not possible to find two children that are perfectly identical, even in the case of identical twins. Some unique traits, just as in adults, set them apart from each other and create their unique being.
Perspective 4: Children as Members of a Distinct Group
All social beings belong to and operate within groups. They range from primary, secondary to reference groups. Perspective number three above defined children as social beings, and as such, they belong to a distinct group in the society. This is the view that is held by this perspective (Mills and Mills 2000 8).
One character of childhood that makes this view hold water is that, their differences notwithstanding, children do share some characteristics (Mills and Mills 2000 2). One qualification for a group to be formed is that the members must have some commonality. Children do have some similar traits, which are, among others, age and experience. This makes them belong to a group, but there are other characteristics that make this group distinct, separate from, for example, that occupied by adults. According to Mills and Mills (2000 9), cognitive and other aspects of children set them apart from adults, making their group distinct.
Perspective 5: Children as Vulnerable
A vulnerable individual is that who is exposed to danger, who can easily be harmed. According to Mills and Mills, depiction in the media of children in deplorable conditions brought unto them by adults drives this point home; they are fragile and malleable creatures (2000 10). Vulnerability here is conceptualised when one views the child in the context of a ruthless society. Society that is full of civil unrest, drought, ideological as well as military warfare. The children, being innocent and powerless as they are, stand a higher chance of being affected negatively by these happenstances.
A character that qualifies this perspective is the fact that children are dependent beings, depending on the adults for guidance in the world. They also have the tendency to take thing at face value, and as such, lack critical capability of discerning what is good and evil, and what they ought to do and not.
Perspective 6: Children as Animals
It is a fact that humans are similar to animals in various aspects. But children are more so. Like animals, children can be trained and “reared” as the guardian wishes. This is not unlike breaking a horse or training a dog (Mills and Mills 2000 9). Truby King, as quoted by Mills and Mills (2000 9), seems to share this perspective to some extent. He is of the view that children should be brought up with a touch of rigidity and strictness on the part of the parent.
Their innocence, coupled with their powerlessness, makes the children vulnerable to treatment like animals. They are helpless and vulnerable before the adult, just like animals. They also possess the same attribute of taking the authority of the adult unquestioned. A dog will never question the edicts of the master, neither will a child to those of the parent. This is not to mean that they can not do this; it is just that they stand being punished for it.
Authors’ Views on Childhood
Bruno Bettelheim: Value of Fairy Tales
Fairy tales are important facets of childhood. As adults regale children with them, they help to fire the imagination of the young mind, despite the fact that they may be untrue rendition of the real world. Some adults are of the view that these tales have a negative effect on the child, as they tend to distort the truth, the reality.
Bruno holds a different view from this. Being an educator and therapist and therapist of children that are severely disturbed in the society, his opinions should be taken with a measure of weight. He is of the view that truth, as far as the child’s world is concerned, I different from what the adults conceptualises it to be (Bettelheim 1976: 116). As such, what the adult may take as being a misrepresentation of the truth may hold in the adult world, but regarded otherwise by the child. Bettelheim also holds that it is erroneous to think that the children take the tales as reality per se (1976 117). To the contrary, they are able to discern, with a measure of success, that they are not reality.
Many fairy tales have happy endings. This is very important to the child. The writer of this essay agrees with Bettelheim as far as the value of fairy tales is concerned. If happy endings are eliminated from fairy tales, this will create a picture of the fact that problems in this world are unconquerable. As such, fairy tales are very important to the life of the child.
Postman’s Beliefs on the Danger of Television
Negative effects that television has on children is not a new theme in the society. A lot of studies have been done to this effect. But Postman, in his book Amusing Ourselves to Death, gives us a new perspective to the effects of television. He does not state the obviated; rather, he tells us that television has reduced everything in the society to entertainment (Postman 1985 58). Religion, economy, politics and other aspects of our lives are now fodder for entertainment, courtesy of television.
This being the case, the danger of television when it comes to children cannot be ignored, and here the writer of this essay concurs with Postman. They are erroneously made to believe that life is one huge entertainment. This is because television, according to Postman (1985 68) cannot be taken to mean otherwise. It is just a source of entertainment.
Truby King’s Attitudes towards the Rearing of Children
Truby King is of the view that children should be reared within strict condition, such that Truby King’s children are identifiable by their high rate of respect of orders given by adults (Mills and Mills 2000 10). This is erroneous, since children are not animals. As such, they should not be treated with strictness and harshness as advocated by Truby. On the contrary, they should be let to be children.
Abb’s Notion on the Impossibility of Recovering Childhood
Abb believes that it is impossible to recover childhood. Once that stage is gone, it is never to be visited again, nor to be experienced once more. This is true. Childhood is a transient stage, and just like any developmental stage in humans, you cannot recover it. Wrongs done on childhood are very hard to correct later in life. Despite the fact that it is hard to recover childhood, the effects of the experiences at this stage will live on and persist through the years. Traumatic experiences and such other occurrences will determine the quality of life at adulthood.
An Interview with my Friend
Just the other day, I interviewed my friend about his childhood experiences and memories in an effort to look at whether text book cases apply in real life. From the interview, I was able to garner that this friend of mine had a relatively stable childhood, despite the fact that he was brought up in Africa. He remembers been taken to safaris by his dad, and the good moments they shared with his brother, sister and mother in Africa.
The findings of this interview made me reflect on the media’s depiction of Africa as a dark continent, where children are vulnerable and all they can be is soldiers. My friend was educated, and his family never suffered from ordinary occurrences from others in America. However, his case should be treated with caution, for he is not a true representation of African childhood. This is because he was privileged, a son of an American diplomat posted in east Africa. As such, his experiences may have differed with those of an ordinary African boy.
Developments in the History of Childhood
Mills and Mills (2000 200) opine that history of childhood is a recent phenomenon. Despite this, it has grown in popularity. Empirical study of childhood history can be traced to the translation to English of the book Centuries of Childhood by Aries in 1962 (Mills and Mills 2000 210).
There is a consensus among scholars that today’s childhood is better than that of the nineteenth century. The latter is the period when infanticide, illiteracy and other catastrophes like wars used to deny children their innocence. However, the idea that children’s welfare has improved from one century to the other has been opposed by many people (Mills and Mills 2000 206). This is because economic and social environment among other factors do change in the society, and with them the experiences of children there in. it is fallacious to think that legislations that favoured children benefited all of them. For example, not all children attend school after the introduction of universal education and abolishment of child labour.
Benefits accrued to children in the nineteenth century were, to some extent, related to the fact that children could now spend their childhood in school, and were not exposed to vagaries of life at an earlier stage.
Constructionist vs. Essentialist Perspectives
Mills and Mills (2000 207) are of the view that the huge number of theoretical orientations in childhood studies notwithstanding, there is essentially two approaches adopted by many scholars. These are constructionism and essentialism. The latter conceptualises childhood as a biological phenomenon. A case in point is Neil Thew (Mills and Mills 2000), who subscribe to the view that childhood “is a fundamental human experience, defined by biology and where common themes in its experience can be traced over time” (Mills and Mills 2000 78). This means that childhood is part of biological development in human beings, and every human has to transit through it. It is defined by a specific period of time in the person’s life.
Constructionists, on the other hand, believe that the phenomena child and childhood can stand for different things at different places and times (Mills and Mills 2000 210). This means that due to the fact that they are referred to as a child, the individual must be undergoing childhood. This is because these two terms do not only mean different things to different people at different times and places, but they are also constructed differently. Lesnik-Oberstein (1998 21) as quoted by Mills and Mills (2000 79) are some of the scholars who subscribe to this school of thought.
Uncovering the History of Childhood
Rhodes Maxine, writing in Mills and Mills (2000 79) is of the view that the way historians capture childhood dynamism in society varies from one period to the other. This is given the fact that history, as argued by many scholars for long, is far from absolute truth.
This train of though is captured by Michael Morpurgo in his series The Invention of Childhood, on BBC. This man holds that the experiences of children have differed from one century to the other. This is from the eleventh century, when Christianity, Black Death among other things impacted on childhood, to the present impacts of mass media and technological innovations on childhood (Morpurgo 2006 1). This man wonders whether changes in contemporary society herald the inevitable disappearance of childhood, or whether the latter will continue reinventing itself (Morpurgo 2006 1). This is a question that Maxine says needs to be researched on, and this is what current scholars are trying to do.
Works Cited
Bettelheim, Bruno. 1976. The Uses of Enchantment: The Meaning and Importance of Fairy Tales. New York: The Free Press, 110-120.
Goldstein, Jonathan. “Neil Postman’s Criticisms of the Television Media”. 2009. Web.
Mills, Jean & Mills, Richard W. 2000. Childhood Studies: A Reader in Perspectives of Childhood. London: Routledge, 6-10, 200-210.
Morpurgo, Michael. “The Invention of Childhood.” BBC. January 2007. Web.
Postman, Neil. 1985. Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business. London: Penguin Books.