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I was surprised to read this in Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child#As_a_non-adult http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child#As_a_non-adult - "Recognition of

by jonmc12 15y ago

I was surprised to read this in Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child#As_a_non-adult http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child#As_a_non-adult - "Recognition of childhood as a state different from adulthood began to emerge in the 16th and 17th centuries. Society began to relate to the child not as a miniature adult but as a person of a lower level of maturity needing adult protection, love and nurturing. This change can be traced in painting: In the Middle Ages, children were portrayed in art as miniature adults with no childish characteristics. In the 16th century, images of children began to acquire a distinct childish appearance. From the late 17th century onwards, children were shown playing." However, reading the source article (http://www.elizabethi.org/uk/essays/childhood.htm http://www.elizabethi.org/uk/essays/childhood.htm), I would say that this point of view (Lawrence Stone, et al) is not well supported. First, realize that this insight was made only to studies of the UK from 1500-1800 (a period very likely marked more strongly by society's ability to express notions of childhood through art - the renaissance, than to evolve the definition of human childhood so rapidly). Second, Stone himself abandoned the thesis of his work in the 1980s (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Stone#Ideas http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Stone#Ideas) as more evidence about this time period was presented by his peers. I suspect that some of these theories would not have emerged at all if evolutionary psychology, our understanding of the mammalian brain, and studies of mammals in their natural child-rearing environments had been readily available at the time when "The Family, Sex and Marriage in England, 1500-1800" was written. Anyhow, I challenge that wikipedia probably should not quote the work in this context in the 'Child' page, nor should it be treated as a credible theory in the discussion of this article.

ams6110 15y ago
I don't think that point of view even makes sense. Humans and lower mammals are all born more or less helpless. They require caring parents for nourishment and protection in order to survive. Certainly you can argue that the period of "childhood" has been greatly extended in recent centuries, but it makes no sense that the concept of a child as something other than just a physically smaller adult emerged in the 16th century.
- chipsy 15y ago
  If the vocabulary doesn't exist(or isn't predominant), it becomes hard to point out the distinctions. Certainly, humans recognized from pre-civilized times that there were children, but expectations of children were going to be different - in a smaller tribal society, for instance, each one would be a unique person. A more recent concept is the idea of the "teenager" in western culture - people who aren't adults and aren't children either.
kijin 15y ago
It seems that the thesis that Stone abandoned (according to your third link) was about love in marriage, not about the increasing awareness of children's nature. He may have had multiple theses, not all of which he abandoned. The idea that Western societies' perception of children went from "miniature adult" to "distinct category of human" in the 16th and 17th century is not an unusual theory among Renaissance scholars. It might not be the most accurate description of what happened, but its credibility is not as suspicious as you seem to think it is. Art historians regularly appeal to this theory, not only in English contexts, but also when talking about Italian art and the rest of Renaissance. My sister (an art history major) wrote an honors paper on Titian a couple of years ago, focusing on how the artist's portrayal of children changed over the decades. There are transitions that cannot be explained simply by saying "He was just trying to paint more realistically". For example, the context, setting, composition, props, etc. of this painting (http://www.humanitiesweb.org/human.php?s=g&p=c&a=p&ID=9732 http://www.humanitiesweb.org/human.php?s=g&p=c&a=p&#...), when analyzed with the usual tools of art historians and compared to other paintings of children, suggest that at least part of the transition involved a shift in the concept of a child. The way in which similar portrayals spread throughout Europe in the following decades also supports the theory that this new concept was being rapidly adopted and developed. (I'm not an art historian so I can't explain this very well, but I'm sure there are many scholarly sources for this.) Artists might not have invented the new concept of a child, but they were certainly responding to it -- and Renaissance artists were often the first to respond to the latest philosophical developments of their times.
- jerf 15y ago
  Counterpoint to the original article, based on your comments: Children do exist, because civilization exists. You could also say "civilization doesn't exist, we invented it", but that falsely implies that things we invent don't exist, which regardless of what definitions you use for any of the critical words in that sentence, it's way too bizarre an idea to slip into the discussion unexamined. I would say that as civilization has deviated farther and farther from the "default" of human civilizations, we come out of the womb increasingly less adjusted to it and therefore we have created a distinct phase of "maladjusted human" in our discourse to reflect it. And it is a real phase, which we must really be educated out of, or the result is a slide back to the default human state, which you may also know from the word "barbarism". As I rather like "civilization", however artificial it may be, I'm OK with the "invented" child phase, and actually not terribly impressed with the original essay as it is written. Extol the virtues of having an open mind, sure, but children don't just have open minds, they are frankly stupidly open minds, and a variety of other difficulties like a near complete inability to rationally account for future consequences, even ones clearly mere seconds away (at the younger end). I don't believe the author can accurately describe his behavior as "childlike", because if he really was acting like a child, he would not be able to claim it was successful. I know 25-yo man children. Heck, I know a mid-40s man child. We're counting down the months until he gets arrested for some form of tax evasion, on the grounds of not really feeling like doing them. This is not a successful lifestyle. There's a lot more to "childlike" than having an open mind and a certain blind, stupid perseverance (that, might I add, only really works out if the adults in the life have created the proper environment).

by jonmc12 15y ago

ams6110 15y ago

I don't think that point of view even makes sense. Humans and lower mammals are all born more or less helpless. They require caring parents for nourishment and protection in order to survive. Certainly you can argue that the period of "childhood" has been greatly extended in recent centuries, but it makes no sense that the concept of a child as something other than just a physically smaller adult emerged in the 16th century.

chipsy 15y ago
If the vocabulary doesn't exist(or isn't predominant), it becomes hard to point out the distinctions. Certainly, humans recognized from pre-civilized times that there were children, but expectations of children were going to be different - in a smaller tribal society, for instance, each one would be a unique person. A more recent concept is the idea of the "teenager" in western culture - people who aren't adults and aren't children either.

kijin 15y ago

It seems that the thesis that Stone abandoned (according to your third link) was about love in marriage, not about the increasing awareness of children's nature. He may have had multiple theses, not all of which he abandoned. The idea that Western societies' perception of children went from "miniature adult" to "distinct category of human" in the 16th and 17th century is not an unusual theory among Renaissance scholars. It might not be the most accurate description of what happened, but its credibility is not as suspicious as you seem to think it is. Art historians regularly appeal to this theory, not only in English contexts, but also when talking about Italian art and the rest of Renaissance. My sister (an art history major) wrote an honors paper on Titian a couple of years ago, focusing on how the artist's portrayal of children changed over the decades. There are transitions that cannot be explained simply by saying "He was just trying to paint more realistically". For example, the context, setting, composition, props, etc. of this painting (http://www.humanitiesweb.org/human.php?s=g&p=c&a=p&ID=9732 http://www.humanitiesweb.org/human.php?s=g&p=c&a=p&#...), when analyzed with the usual tools of art historians and compared to other paintings of children, suggest that at least part of the transition involved a shift in the concept of a child. The way in which similar portrayals spread throughout Europe in the following decades also supports the theory that this new concept was being rapidly adopted and developed. (I'm not an art historian so I can't explain this very well, but I'm sure there are many scholarly sources for this.) Artists might not have invented the new concept of a child, but they were certainly responding to it -- and Renaissance artists were often the first to respond to the latest philosophical developments of their times.

jerf 15y ago
Counterpoint to the original article, based on your comments: Children do exist, because civilization exists. You could also say "civilization doesn't exist, we invented it", but that falsely implies that things we invent don't exist, which regardless of what definitions you use for any of the critical words in that sentence, it's way too bizarre an idea to slip into the discussion unexamined. I would say that as civilization has deviated farther and farther from the "default" of human civilizations, we come out of the womb increasingly less adjusted to it and therefore we have created a distinct phase of "maladjusted human" in our discourse to reflect it. And it is a real phase, which we must really be educated out of, or the result is a slide back to the default human state, which you may also know from the word "barbarism". As I rather like "civilization", however artificial it may be, I'm OK with the "invented" child phase, and actually not terribly impressed with the original essay as it is written. Extol the virtues of having an open mind, sure, but children don't just have open minds, they are frankly stupidly open minds, and a variety of other difficulties like a near complete inability to rationally account for future consequences, even ones clearly mere seconds away (at the younger end). I don't believe the author can accurately describe his behavior as "childlike", because if he really was acting like a child, he would not be able to claim it was successful. I know 25-yo man children. Heck, I know a mid-40s man child. We're counting down the months until he gets arrested for some form of tax evasion, on the grounds of not really feeling like doing them. This is not a successful lifestyle. There's a lot more to "childlike" than having an open mind and a certain blind, stupid perseverance (that, might I add, only really works out if the adults in the life have created the proper environment).