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The Children's Table: Childhood Studies and the Humanities
Like the occupants of the children's table at a family dinner, scholars working in childhood studies can seem sidelined from the "adult" labor of humanities scholarship. The Children's Table brings together scholars from architecture, philosophy, law, and literary and cultural criticism to provide an overview of the innovative work being done in childhood studies―a transcript of what is being said at the children's table. Together, these scholars argue for rethinking the academic seating arrangement in a way that acknowledges the centrality of childhood to the work of the humanities.
The figure we now recognize as a child was created in tandem with forms of modernity that the Enlightenment generated and that the humanities are now working to rethink. Thus the growth of childhood studies allows for new approaches to some of the most important and provocative issues in humanities the viability of the social contract, the definition of agency, the performance of identity, and the construction of gender, sexuality, and race. Because defining childhood is a means of defining and distributing power and obligation, studying childhood requires a radically altered approach to what constitutes knowledge about the human subject.
The diverse essays in The Children's Table share a unifying to include the child in any field of study realigns the shape of that field, changing the terms of inquiry and forcing a different set of questions. Taken as a whole, the essays argue that, at this key moment in the state of the humanities, rethinking the child is both necessary and revolutionary.
Annette Ruth Appell, Sophie Bell, Robin Bernstein, Sarah Chinn, Lesley Ginsberg, Lucia Hodgson, Susan Honeyman, Roy Kozlovsky, James Marten, Karen Sánchez-Eppler, Carol Singley, Lynne Vallone, John Wall.
The figure we now recognize as a child was created in tandem with forms of modernity that the Enlightenment generated and that the humanities are now working to rethink. Thus the growth of childhood studies allows for new approaches to some of the most important and provocative issues in humanities the viability of the social contract, the definition of agency, the performance of identity, and the construction of gender, sexuality, and race. Because defining childhood is a means of defining and distributing power and obligation, studying childhood requires a radically altered approach to what constitutes knowledge about the human subject.
The diverse essays in The Children's Table share a unifying to include the child in any field of study realigns the shape of that field, changing the terms of inquiry and forcing a different set of questions. Taken as a whole, the essays argue that, at this key moment in the state of the humanities, rethinking the child is both necessary and revolutionary.
Annette Ruth Appell, Sophie Bell, Robin Bernstein, Sarah Chinn, Lesley Ginsberg, Lucia Hodgson, Susan Honeyman, Roy Kozlovsky, James Marten, Karen Sánchez-Eppler, Carol Singley, Lynne Vallone, John Wall.
280 pages, Paperback
First published June 1, 2013
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
June 13, 2024
lots of interesting chapters
December 30, 2019
El título del libro hace referencia a la mesa a la que mandan a los niños en todas las fiestas familiares. Para las personas que nos hemos pasado la carrera explicando / justificando / casi disculpándonos o pidiendo permiso para estudiar la infancia, este es el libro más refrescante. Habla de todo -arquitectura, derechos humanos, política, literatura, archivo, estética- desde la mesa de los niños, y al final uno inevitablemente se pregunta si no será hora de cambiar la disposición de todas las mesas de la fiesta.
January 23, 2015
“As an endeavor that focuses on children with the intent of locating and studying their agency, childhood studies defies the easy divisions of biology and culture, body and book. More precisely, childhood studies demonstrates how the science we apply to children and, by extension, to human development has been shaped by cultural narratives about independence and autonomy – stories that were forged in opposition to an imagined child” (3).
This is a smart collection of articles that presents distinct visions of how childhood is constructed historically and in the present moment. I particularly appreciate Annette Ruth Appell's article about the law and children and the last article by Lynne Vallone, one of the founders of the childhood studies discipline, as she discusses the origin and the future of the field - as well as discusses the intersection of childhood studies with children's literature. Vallone discusses how, within children's literature studies, there is a separation between self-described "book people" and "child people" (244), However, for her, integrating these areas (especially in having her "child people" students think carefully and critically about visual studies) can be particularly beneficial.
While this text isn't a clear fit with my own work, it is helping me rethink some of my own readings of children's literature and how I describe "the Child."
This is a smart collection of articles that presents distinct visions of how childhood is constructed historically and in the present moment. I particularly appreciate Annette Ruth Appell's article about the law and children and the last article by Lynne Vallone, one of the founders of the childhood studies discipline, as she discusses the origin and the future of the field - as well as discusses the intersection of childhood studies with children's literature. Vallone discusses how, within children's literature studies, there is a separation between self-described "book people" and "child people" (244), However, for her, integrating these areas (especially in having her "child people" students think carefully and critically about visual studies) can be particularly beneficial.
While this text isn't a clear fit with my own work, it is helping me rethink some of my own readings of children's literature and how I describe "the Child."
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews