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Article: Child-Rearing Advice Literature
- Article from:
- Encyclopedia of Children and Childhood in History and Society
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CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2004 The Gale Group Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Child-Rearing Advice Literature
The very appearance of printed advice literature meant to help parents rear a child signals a profound historical change in the social distribution of knowledge. In most cultures, across space and time, child-rearing advice is an oral genre found in face-to-face groups. Grandparents and other members of the extended family living with or near young parents are available to dispense advice and, often, to participate actively in the rearing of children. The oral culture of child-rearing advice still thrives, even in modern industrialized societies, where mothers might seek and offer advice in a conversation with other women, or where fathers might have ...