Why Don't Anthropologists Like Children?

Abstract

Few major works in anthropology focus specifically on children, a curious state of affairs given that virtually all contemporary anthropology is based on the premise that culture is learned, not inherited. Although children have a remarkable and undisputed capacity for learning generally, and learning culture in particular, in significant measure anthropology has shown little interest in them and their lives. This article examines the reasons for this lamentable lacunae and offers theoretical and empirical reasons for repudiating it. Resistance to child-focused scholarship, it is argued, is a byproduct of (1) an impoverished view of cultural learning that overestimates the role adults play and underestimates the contribution that children make to cultural reproduction, and (2) a lack of appreciation of the scope and force of children's culture, particularly in shaping adult culture. The marginalization of children and childhood, it is proposed, has obscured our understanding of how cultural forms emerge and why they are sustained. Two case studies, exploring North American children's beliefs about social contamination, illustrate these points. [Keywords: anthropology of childhood, children's culture, acquisition of cultural knowledge, race]

Estudos sociais da infância: discutindo a constituição de um campo a luz de Bourdieu

“…Conforme Hirschfeld (2002), as correntes centrais da antropologia estiveram desinformadas quanto a esse grupo populacional. As crianças, com frequência, serviram apenas como "parte da decoração" da etnografia, tendo suas brincadeiras e suas vidas usadas para "colorir o pano de fundo" da vida dos adultos, das suas relações e da cultura mais ampla (CHRISTENSEN; PROUT, 2005, p. 47).…”

Identity Development Among Youth of Vietnamese Descent in the Czech Republic

“…They definitely cannot be seen as "just" cultural brokers who only translate the culture of the migrant country to their parents. They should rather be seen as active members of the society who consciously create a culture of their own (Hirschfeld 2002).…”

The Archaeology of Childhood: Revisiting Mohenjodaro Terracotta

“…Thus, it is that archaeologists currently studying pre and protohistoric terracotta (Neolithic, Chalcolithic and Harappan) are faced with the problem of assigning significance to these objects. Hirschfeld (2002) has argued that since anthropology has been based on the premise that culture is learned and not genetically inherited, this makes studies of children and childhood among the most natural areas of interest for all archaeologists (Baxter, 2008). We may posit further that the terracotta of a particular area, if indeed they are children's playthings, should give us a view of constructions of childhood of that area.…”