Inventing the Child: Culture, Ideology, and the Story of Childhood (Children's Literature and Culture, 17)

This book traces the historical roots of Western culture's stories of childhood in which the child is subjugated to the adult. Going back 400 years, it looks again at Hamlet, fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm, and Walt Disney cartoons. Inventing the Child is a highly entertaining, humorous, and at times acerbic account of what it means to be a child (and a parent) in America at the dawn of the new millennium. John Zornado explores the history and development of the concept of childhood, starting with the works of Calvin, Freud, and Rousseau and culminating with the modern "consumer" childhood of Dr. Spock and television. The volume discusses major media depictions of childhood and examines the ways in which parents use different forms of media to swaddle, educate, and entertain their children. Zornado argues that the stories we tell our children contain the ideologies of the dominant culture--which, more often than not, promote "happiness" at all costs, materialism as the way to happiness, and above all, obedience to the dominant order. Now in paperback, Inventing the Child is a highly entertaining, humorous, and at times acerbic account of what it means to be a child (and a parent) in America at the dawn of the new millennium. J. Zornado explores the history and development of the concept of childhood, starting with the works of Calvin, Freud, and Rousseau and culminating with the modern'consumer'childhood of Dr. Spock and television. The volume discusses major media depictions of childhood and examines the ways in which parents use different forms of media to swaddle, educate, and entertain their children. Zornado argues that the stories we tell our children contain the ideologies of the dominant culture - which, more often than not, promote'happiness'at all costs, materialism as the way to happiness, and above all, obedience to the dominant order. Book Cover......Page 1 Title......Page 4 Contents......Page 5 Series Editor's Foreword......Page 10 Acknowledgments......Page 12 Introduction......Page 14 History as Human Relationship......Page 24 Freud, Shakespeare, and Hamlet as Children's Literature......Page 56 The Brothers Grimm, the Black Pedagogy, and the Roots of Fascist Culture......Page 94 Victorian Imperialism and the Golden Age of Children's Literature......Page 124 Walt Disney, Ideological Transposition, and the Child......Page 158 Maurice Sendak and the Detachment Child......Page 194 Conclusion: The Etiology of Consumerism......Page 224 Bibliography......Page 246 Index......Page 254 Tracing the historical roots of Western culture's stories of childhood, this book looks at those texts in which the child is subjugated to the adult. Going back 400 years, it looks at Hamlet, the Brothers Grimm and Walt Disney cartoons The story of Western culture is, according to the conventional wisdom, a story of progress, growth, and development.