The Nineteenth-Century Child and Consumer Culture (Studies in Childhood, 1700 to the Present)

During the rise of consumer culture in the nineteenth century, children and childhood were called on to fulfill a range of important roles. In addition to being consumers themselves, the young functioned as both 'goods' to be used and consumed by adults and as proof that middle-class materialist ventures were assisting in the formation of a more ethical society. Children also provided necessary labor and raw material for industry. This diverse collection addresses the roles assigned to children in the context of nineteenth-century consumer culture, at the same time that it remains steadfast in recognizing that the young did not simply exist within adult-articulated cultural contexts but were agents in their formation. Topics include toys and middle-class childhood; boyhood and toy theater; child performers on the Victorian stage; gender, sexuality and consumerism; imperialism in adventure fiction; the idealization of childhood as a form of adult entertainment and self-flattery; the commercialization of orphans; and the economics behind formulations of child poverty. Together, the essays demonstrate the rising investment both children and adults made in commodities as sources of identity and human worth. Cover 1 Half Title 2 Title 4 Copyright 5 Contents 6 Figures 8 Contributors 10 Acknowledgements 12 Introduction Small Change: The Consumerist Designs of the Nineteenth-Century Child 14 PART 1: Play Things: Toys and Theater 40 1 Experiments before Breakfast: Toys, Education and Middle-Class Childhood 42 2 Paper Dreams and Romantic Projections: The Nineteenth-Century Toy Theater, Boyhood and Aesthetic Play 56 3 The Drama of Precocity: Child Performers on the Victorian Stage 76 PART 2: Consuming Desires 92 4 "I'm not a bit expensive": Henry James and the Sexualization of the Victorian Girl 94 5 For-getting to Eat: Alice's Mouthing Metonymy 108 6 Salome's Lost Childhood: Wilde's Daughter of Sodom, Jugendstil Culture and the Queer Afterlife of a Decadent Myth 132 PART 3: Adulthood and Nationhood 148 7 Adult Children's Literature in Victorian Britain 150 8 Home Thoughts and Home Scenes: Packaging Middle-class Childhood for Christmas Consumption 164 9 Maps, Pirates and Treasure: The Commodification of Imperialism in Nineteenth-Century Boys' Adventure Fiction 186 PART 4: Children and the Terrors of Cultural Consumption 200 10 Toys and Terror: Lucy Clifford's Anyhow Stories 202 11 "We have orphans [...] in stock": Crime and the Consumption of Sensational Children 214 12 "And now Tom being killed, and all spent and eaten": Children, Consumption and Commerce in Nineteenth-Century Child-Protection Discourse 230 Index 244 Addresses the roles assigned to children in the context of 19th-century consumer culture. This collection includes topics such as toys and middle-class childhood; boyhood and toy theater; child performers on the Victorian stage; imperialism in adventure fiction; and, the idealization of childhood as a form of adult entertainment and self-flattery This collection addresses the roles assigned to children in the context of 19th-century consumer culture. Topics include toys and middle-class childhood, boyhood and toy theater, child performers on the Victorian stage, gender, sexuality and consumerism, and imperialism in adventure fiction. [edited By] Dennis Denisoff. Includes Bibliographical References And Index.