Symbolic Childhood

Daniel Thomas Cook

ISBN 10: 0820455806 / ISBN 13: 9780820455808

Published by Peter Lang Ltd. International Academic Publishers Jul 2002, 2002

About this Item

This item is printed on demand - it takes 3-4 days longer - Neuware -In a dozen original essays, contributors to Symbolic Childhood engage directly with the politics of representation by scrutinizing the connection between the exercise of power and portrayals of children and childhood. The volume as a whole construes childhood not as a given category, transparently understood, but as a thoroughly social artifact infused with contradictory and inexact meaning. As a social construct, childhood is thus approached as an active production which can be taken apart and reconstructed in a variety of ways, and for a variety of purposes. Chapters examine a range of issues and topics, including: precocious and gifted children, gender, sexuality, innocence, school shootings, cartoons, video games, adoption, street children, and feral children. 296 pp. Englisch.

Seller Inventory # 9780820455808

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Symbolic Childhood
• Publisher: Peter Lang Ltd. International Academic Publishers Jul 2002
• Publication Date: 2002
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0820455806
• ISBN 13: 9780820455808
• Binding: Taschenbuch
• Condition: Neu
• Dimensions: 230W x 160H x 16D millimeters 230 millimeters width by 160 millimeters height by 16 millimeters depth
• Weight: 475 grams

About this title

Synopsis

In a dozen original essays, contributors to Symbolic Childhood engage directly with the politics of representation by scrutinizing the connection between the exercise of power and portrayals of children and childhood. The volume as a whole construes childhood not as a given category, transparently understood, but as a thoroughly social artifact infused with contradictory and inexact meaning. As a social construct, childhood is thus approached as an active production which can be taken apart and reconstructed in a variety of ways, and for a variety of purposes. Chapters examine a range of issues and topics, including: precocious and gifted children, gender, sexuality, innocence, school shootings, cartoons, video games, adoption, street children, and feral children.

About the Author

The Editor: Daniel Thomas Cook received his Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Chicago and is currently Assistant Professor in the Departments of Advertising and Sociology at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. He has published a number of articles examining the commodification of childhood and is currently working on a manuscript on the rise of the child-consumer in the United States in the twentieth century.