Global Politics of Childhood

Childhood has only recently come to be recognized as a socially constructed entity. Although children have existed for as long as humankind has, childhood as a sociocultural phenomenon did not engage the interests of academics and policy makers until very much later. In the Western world, it was not until the publication of Philippe Ariès’s book on the history of childhood in 1962 titled Centuries of Childhood that childhood came to be recognized as a distinct phenomenon and came to be studied on its own. Although Ariès has since come under some scrutiny and criticism for overexaggerating the lack of distinction between children and adults in medieval times, his work remains significant in that it paved the way for an entire field of study to ...