The Social Construction of Childhood

The Sociology of Childhood

In this course, Professor Karen Wells (Birkbeck, University of London) explores the sociology of childhood. In the first lecture, we think about the idea is childhood is socially constructed. In the second lecture, we consider the idea that children have agency. In the third lecture, we think about child rights and the emergence of a 'child rights regime'. Next, we think about the inequalities that shape childhood. In the fifth lecture, we think about different theories of identity emerging from psychology and childhood studies. In the sixth lecture, we turn to think about school and work as domains of childhood. In the seventh and final lecture, we think about the juvenile justice system.

The Social Construction of Childhood

In this lecture, we think about the idea that childhood is socially constructed, focusing in particular on: (i) the extent to which race and gender are socially-constructed; (ii) the influence of the liberation movements in general, and of feminism in particular, on the development of childhood studies; (iii) the emergence of childhood studies as an academic discipline in the late 1980s, and the growing interest in the rights of children more generally at precisely the same time, e.g. UN Convention of the Rights of Children; (iv) the centrality of the idea that childhood is at least partially socially constructed; and (v) the work of Philippe Ariès (1914-84), including his (erroneous) claim that childhood 'did not exist' before the Middle Ages in Europe.