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Article: Sociology and Anthropology of Childhood
- Article from:
- Encyclopedia of Children and Childhood in History and Society
- Author:
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Sociology and Anthropology of Childhood
Prior to the 1980s children were on the margins of sociology (an academic discipline that focuses on social relations and
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institutions) and anthropology (a neighboring field that emphasizes the study of culture). When children did come into the view of anthropologists, they were primarily studied as learners being inducted into the social and cultural worlds of adults. In the 1930s the anthropologist Margaret Mead wrote about cross-cultural variation in child-rearing practices, which, she argued, shape cultural differences in adult personalities. Over the next four decades anthropologists continued this line of inquiry in places as ...