Anxious Parents: A History of Modern Childrearing in America

by Peter N. Stearns

Book Overview

An examination into the history of modern parenting

The nineteenth and twentieth centuries saw a dramatic shift in the role of children in American society and families. No longer necessary for labor, children became economic liabilities and twentieth-century parents exhibited a new level of anxiety concerning the welfare of their children and their own ability to parent effectively. What caused this shift in the ways parenting and...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0814798292
• ISBN13: 9780814798294
• Release Date: May 2003
• Publisher: New York University Press
• Length: 251 Pages
• Weight: 1.16 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 6.3" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

Child is Bother to the Man (and Woman)

This is a brief and wonderful account of how American parents came to be so anxious that fretfulness often seems the predominant state in which we live. (The section called "I'm Bored" is worth the price alone.) It's also reassuring; contrary to the scare-mongering of experts and the media, the kids nowadays are all right. Everyone who has children ought to read this sensible and illuminating work; it's worth 100 times its weight in parenting advice books.