HIST393

The history and experience of childhood and youth are the primary foci of this course which will survey these subjects in European and American history, and the contemporary world. Students will research and write about their own family history and childhood. They will read about children and childhood in the west, the childhoods of some famous individuals, and the changes in childrearing through the ages. Changing attitudes and behaviors regarding infanticide, swaddling, child abandonment, child labor, obligations to elders, arranged marriage, and physical punishment will be explored.