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by: Lloyd deMause
Special Issue
"On Writing Childhood History"
The Journal of Psychohistory 16 (2) Fall 1988
I know I've yet to clean these up - please feel free to contact me at [email protected] or Lloyd at above - to get anything you can't read here. Also I will be getting to these at some time - right now I'm inputting text. Thank you ~~~e
FYI this is how these came out of the scanner -
I. The sponsor of the American Imago, the Association for
Applied Psychoanalysis, ap-pointed me their Director of Research,
and I conducted my initial research on The History of Childhood
hook under their auspices, but they actually refused to publish
anything in their journal that resulted from my work. See Lloyd
deMause, Psycho-geneotogy: New Directions of Research in Applied
Psychoanalysis. Report to the Association for Applied
Psychoanalysis, Inc,, December 2, 1968,
2. The closest anthropologists came to recognizing the
lautological quality of the "culture and personality"
modeL was in Melford Spiro's excellent artkle "Culture and
Personality: The Natural History of a False Dichotomy,"
Psychiatry 14 (195l):l9~, Few took his words to heart, and
psychoanthropology today is still taught as "culture and
personality" in most college courses.
3. Asking the questi6n this way, of course, opens one to the
charges of "psychological reductionism," and
predictably these charges have been made against much of my
writing since that time. When one, however, removes the
pejorative tone from the charge and instead accepts the goal of
reductLon as part 0f the search for scientific simplicity, one
ends up with a model of what philosophers have termed
"methodological individualism," which accepts that only
individuals have motives, but allows that individuals in groups
may have different motives than when alone. This methodological
stance only works, of course, when the psychological theory one
works with is "social" at base, as is psychoanalysis,
where the individual psyche is already teeming with
"others." See j .W.N. Watkins, "Methodological
Individualism and Non-Hempelian [deal Types," in Leonard I.
Krimerman, ed., The Nature and Scope r,f Social Science: A
Critical Anrhrc}kigy. New York: Appleton-Cent~y-Crofts, 1969,
pi'. 457-72; George C. Ijornaris, The Nature' of Social Science.
New York: ilarcourt, Brace and World, 1967.
4. Sigmund Freud, quoted in Herman Nunherg and Ernst Federn,
eds., Minutes 0/the Vienna P4vhoanaiyiic Society. 1908-1910, New
York: Iniernalional Universities Press, [967, p. 174.
3. Ceza Roheim, "The Evolution of Culture," in Bruce
Mazush, ed., Psychoanalysis and History. Englewool Cliffs:
Prentice-Hall, 1963, p. ~4.
6. Geza Roheim, Prychoanolysts and Anthropology: Cu/lure.
Personality attd the tin-conscious. New York: International
Universities Press, 1950, p. 62.
7, Arthur Ili:. Rippler, "Culture and Per~natity Perspective
of the Yotngu of Nor rheastern Ambem Land: Par J~Ear1y
Socialization," JournalofpsychologicaiAn-Ibropology 1(1978):
223-44.
8. Robert A. Paul, "Review of Lloyd deMause's Foundations of
Psychohistory, "The Journal of Psychoanajylic Anthrr4:oh,gy
5(1982):469.
9. In 1988, after a decade or pubikation, the readership of The
Journal of Psychoanalytic Anthropology had dropped from a high of
two thousand to only three hundred, and I had to incorporate it
into The Journal of Psyclrohisroty. Only ilip-pIer, as editor,
wrote the kind of childrearing articles which we had hoped the
journal "'quId attract.
10, Lloyd deMause, "Reply to Paul, Ilalley and
Ciraber," JournalofPsyc.hoana/yiicAn-thropology
5(19s2):4834.
11.. James Strachey, ed., The Standard Edition of the Cornplete
Psychological tt'orks of Signiund Freud. Vol. XXI. Lotidon: The
Hogartln Press, pp.95, 104~5. While Freud wisely ends the essay
with a demurral about whether civiL' zaflon causes unhappiness
(p. 244), his wbote purpose is to show Ibat civilization proceeds
at the expense of sex-ual happiness, panic~arly at the expense of
childhood sexual freedom. Where he was led astray by
anthropologists is in the empirical facts: actua]ly. most
"uncivilized" (Contemporary nonAiterate tribal)
children are in fact sexually molested by adults, not sexually
repressed by them,' see Lloyd deMause, "What Incest
Barrier?" and "The Universality of Incest," Ihe
Journal of Psychohistory l5(l9~8) aid forthcoming.
12, Freud, "Civilization and its Discontents," p. 115.
13. The phrase is that of Frank F. Manuel, "The Use and
Abuse of Psychology in History," Daedalus IOO(197t):203.
14. Philippe Ari~s, Centuries of Childhood.' A Social History of
Family Uc. London: Jonathan Cape, 3962. For a bibliography of
works cattier than Anies, see Hoyl deMause, Foundations
ofPsychohistory. New York: Psychohistory Press, 1962, pp. 64-66.
15. Arils, Ibid, r). 101, 106.
16. 'bid, pp. 103,105.
17. Jean H~roard. Journalde l'enfanceer de laprennierejeunessede
Louis XUr. Edited by Fudore Soulie' and Edouard de Barthtierny. 2
v~s. Paris: Firmin Didot Fr~res, fits Cs cie. 1868.
18. Elizabeth ,Wirth Marvick, Louis XIIL' The Making of a king.
New Haven: Yale University Press, 3986, p.223,
19. Alan Valentine, ed., Fathers to Sons: Advke Without Consent.
Norwan, Oklahoma: University of Oktahoma Press, 1963, p. xxx.
20. Despite this staternent, the author was a careful and honest
hktorian, who reported accurately an the horrors she discovered
in seventecnth-centurr French childhood; see Elisa' beth Wirth
Marvick, "Na~re Versrs Nurture: Patterns and Trends in
Seventeenth-Century French Child-Rearing," iri Lloyd
deMause, ed., The History of Childhod. New York: Psychobistory
Press, 1974, pp.259-301. It was only her conclutons which were
divorced from the evidence she so carefully reported.
.21 - John Demos, A Litrie Conrnton wealth: Pirrni(r Uc in
Plyniouth Colony. New York: Oxford Press, 1970.
22. See Lloyd deMause, Foundations of Psychohtstory. New York:
Creative Roots, l9~2, pp 125-6, Demos's statement about Farle's
lack or evidence can be found on page 133 or A Little Cotrimon
wealth.
23. John Demos, "Child Abuse in Context: An Historian's
Perspective,'' in his Past, Pre-sent and Personal: Ihe Family and
The Life Course inAmencan Hkiory. New York: Oxford University
Press, 1986, pp.68-91. Predictably, when this book was pttblished
many advocates of hitting children cited Demos's work as evidence
that colonial Americans could hit their children without abusing
them; see' 'Positive Side of Spank-ing," Des Moines
Register, September 7, 1988, p. II.
24. Ibid, p.87
25. Ibid, pp.81-82.
26. Pauline Maier, "Family Feuds," The New Republic,
April 13, 987, p.39.
27. Cited in James Bruce Rtsss, ''The Middle-Glass Child in Urban
Italy, Fourteenth to Early Sixteenth Century," in Lloyd
deMause, ed., Tire' History ofChildhooj New York: Psychohistory
Press, 1974 (reprinted, New York: Peter Bedrick Books; 1988), pp.
198-99
28. Ibid, p. 198.
29. Unfortunalely, with only a tifty-page introduction to give my
extensive evidence. I had to be satisfied with long footnotes
backing up each conclusion by marty typical Cx-amples from
primary sources; what had to he left out was the usual lengthy
discus-sions of the reliability of cacti of the sources, which
would have taken three times that space alone and would have
meant I would have had to publish a full book of my own. In view
of the frequent criticism of this essay for sot containing this.
scholarly discussion, perhaps it was a mistake not to have
published a full book of my own from the start. However. without
rIte other nine cotitributors being present, the book would
likely not have been reviewed or read by the general historical
community~as, for in-stance, was the case with my Foundations
ofPss'cltohisrory and Reagan'sAtnerica. In any case, this
discussion of the reliability ofsources wiLl be published more
lilly in my next two books.
30. Lloyd deNlause, "The Evolution of Childhood," in
deMause, The History of Childhood, p. I.
31. joseph F. Ken, The American Historical Review 80(t975):1296.
32. E.P. Hennock, Soeia~ Hktoryv, 3(1978):237. Marvick and
Hennock's supposition that swaddling was primarily a way to keep
babies warm is contradicted by many sources: infants were riot
unswaddled during hot summers; hot countries swaddled as often
and as long as cold countries; swaddling appears to have been
introduced first in Egypt and Mesopotamia; etc.
33. Alan Macfarlane, English Historical Review' 92(1977):594.
34. Keith Thomas, New Statesman, 16 April 1976, p.512.
35. Philippe An'~, "Dc 'enfant roi A l'enfant martyr,"
Revue Psychotogie 68(1975):6.
36, Besides the American edition, the book was published in
England (London: Souvenir Press, 1974); Germany (Bore ihr die
Kinder weinen: Fine psychogenetrsche Geschichte der kindheit.
Frankfurt: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1977); Italy (Storia deIt'infanzia.
Milano: Emme Edizioni, 1983); Spain (Historia de Ia infancia.
Madrid: Aliana Editorial, 1982); and my introductory essay was
reprinted in France as the opening chapter of my Lesfondations de
Ia psycirohistorie. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1982
and by itself in German (Veber die Geschiehte der Kindheit.
Frankfurt: Sulirkamp Verlag, 1979) and in Japanese (Tokyo:
Kaimeisha, 1988). My introductory essay was also reprinted in my
Foundations ofPsychoiristory. New York: Crearive Roots, 1982,
pp.1-83 and elsewhere in abbreviated form.
37. Lawrence Stone, "The Massacre of the Innocents,"
New York Review of Books; November 14, 1974, p- 29. Stone would
later overcome his bewilderment and call my work
"psychological reductionism of the most extreme type."
Sec Lawrence Stone, ihe Past and the Present. Boston: Routledge
& Kegart Paul, 1982, p.41.
38. E.P. Hennock, Soc-jot History 3(1978): 235,237.
39. Glenn Davis, Childhood and History in America. New York:
Psychohistory Press, 976, p.S.
40. Ibid, p.248-9. In answer to those who doubted Davis'
reliability of evidence, reviewer Henry Lawton "personally
made a random survey of relevant material nor cited in the book
and found ample confirmation for its conclusions. Glenn Davis
has, I think, done quite well in avoiding the pitfall of reading
too much into his evidence." Henry W. Lawron, "History
and rIle Lives or Children," The Jotirnal of Psychohistory
4(1977):531.
4t. The New York Times Book Review, April24, 1977, pp. 11,41
42. Robert H, Bremmer, American Historkal Review, 82(1977):
1319-20.
43. howard I. Kushner, Journal ofAnterican History 65(1979):1090.
44. The single review or Davis which considered his
evidence-quite fairly in my opi-nion-was by the psychoanalyst
Miles ~. Shore, "'[he Psychogenic Theory of History,"
Journal oflnrerdisciplinary History 9(1979):5 17-523. Shore also
had earlier written one of the most perceptive reviews of The
History of Childhood, "The Child and Historiography,"
Journal of interdisciplinary History 4(1976)495-505
45 Lloyd deMause, Foundations of Psychohistory p. 300'. David R.
Beisel, "From History to Psychohistory: A Personal
Journey," The Journal of Psychohistory 5(1978):l-66.
46. Kenneth S. Lynn, The Chronicle of Higher Education, January
16, 1978, p.48.
47. Letter to Lloyd deMause, Glenn Davis, February 25, 1980.
48. William L. Langer, "Infanticide: A Historical
Survey," Hislory of Childhood Quarterly l(1974):353-65;
"Further Notes on the History of Infanticide" History
of Childhood Quarterly 2(1974): 129-134.
49 RIchard C. Trexler, "Inranticide in Florence; New Sources
and First Results," History of Childhood Quarterly
l(1973):98-l 16; "The Foundlings of Florence,
1395-1455," History of Childhood Quarterly l( 1973):259-84.
50. Emily Coleman, "Medieval Marriage Characteristics: A
Neglected Factor in the History of Medieval Serrdom,"
Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 2(1971):207-215;
"L'inranticide dans Ic Haul Moyen Age," Annales:
deonotnies, soci4te's, civilisotions, (1974):315-335. Also see
the evidence presented by S. Ryan Johansson, "Centuries of
Childhood/Centuries of Parenting: Philippe Arus and the
Modernization of Privileged Infancy," Journal of Family
History 12(1987):355 that seventeenth-century ruling-class
families had as high infant death rates as the lower classes. who
were "poorly nourished, badly housed, and embedded in a
filthy, disease-ridden environment," showing that these rich
parents "did not want all the in-fants born to them to
survive.
SI "The Formation of the American Personality Through
Psychosp'eciation: Appendix: On the Demography or Filicide,"
The Journal of Psychohistory 4(1976):l-30, reprinted in deMause,
Foundations of Psychohistory. New York: Creative Roots, 1982,
pp.105-131.
52. Joseph Kelt, American Historical Review 8o(1975):1296.
53. Ibid, pp. 117-18. Unfortunately, Herlihy declined my
invitation to reply to my analysis of his and other statistics,
and has not defended his "miscounting" hypothesis
anywhere else since then.
54. Barbara A. Kellum, "Infanticide in England in the Later
Middle Ages," History of Childhood Quarterly
1(1974):367-388; R.H. Helmholz, "Infanticide in the Province
of Canterbury During the Fifteenih Cent ury,'' littrory ~,f (
'Irthihood ottarterly 2(1975):379-90.
55 Lloyd deMause, ''On the Demography or Filicide,'' Foundations
of Psycqtohtstory. New York: Creative RooLs, 1982, p. 123.
56. Bogna W. Lorence, "Parents and Children in
Eighteenth-Century Europe," History of Childhood Quarterly
2(1974):l.
57 Alenka Puhar, "Childhood in Nineteenth-Century
Slovenia," The Jounial of Psychohistory 12(1985):291-312 and
Alenka Puhar Prrottto besedilo Z~Vfl:tr~U (The Prinnary Text
ofLifeJ. Zabreg: Globus, 1982.
58. Puhar, "Childhood in Nineteenth-Century Slovenia,"
pp- 294-301.
59, Friedhelm Nyssen, Die Gesehichie der Kindheir bei L. Dc
Abuse: Quellernhskussion. Frankfurt: Peter Lang, 1985. See also
his "Gescbichte der Kindheit als Schwarze Paedagogik? Zu
Kaiharina Rutschkys Kritik an L. deMause" Jahrbuch der
Aindileit 4(1987):55-66.
60. Aurel Ende, "Battering and Neglect: Cbildren in Germany,
1860-1978," The Journal of Psychohistory 7(1980):249-279;
also see Aurel Ende, "Bibliography on Childhood and Youth in
Germany from 1820-1978: A Selection,'' The Jountal of
Psy{i)Qhisrory 7(1980):281-287; Aurel Enle, "The
Psychohisiorian's Childhood and the Hi' tory of Childhood,"
The Journal ofpsychohiswry 9(1981):173-8: Auret Ende, "Zur
('.c'cliichtc der Stillfeindlichkeit in Deutschland,
1850-1978," Kindheit 1(1979), 203-14. 6 Raffael Scheck,
"Childhood in German Autobiographical Writings,
1740-1820," The Journal of Psychohistory 15(1987):39l -422;
Raffael Scheck, "Aspeicte deutscher Kin-dheit:
1740-1820." Jahrbuch der Kindheii 4(1987)11-35.
62. Ibid, pp.414-S.
63. Seymour Byman, "Child Raising and Melancholia in Tudor
England," The Journal of Psychohistory 6(1978):85.
64. Ibid, p.73
65. Karen Taylor, "Blessing the House: Moral Motherhood and
the Suppression of Physical Punishment," The Journal of
Psychohistory l5(1987):431-54.
66. KarenJ. Taylor, "VenereaL Disease in Nineteenth-Century
Children," Thejournalof Psychohistory 12(1985):43 1-63.
67. This estimate was a personal communicatinn to me from Karen
Taylor.
68. Barbara Finkelstein, "Pcdagogy as Intrusion: Teaching
Value' in Popular Primary Schools in Nineteenth-Century
America," History 'j Childhood Quarterly 2(1975):349-78;
"In Fear of Childhood: Relationships Between Parents and
Teachers in Popular Primary Schools in the Nineteenth
Century," Ibstory of Churl/rood Quarterly 3(1976):321~35;
"The Twain Shall Meet: The History of Childhood and the
History of Education in Documents," The Journal
ofPsychohistory44l977):553-59,' "Schooling and the Discovery
of Latency in Nineteenth-Century America," The Journal of
Psychohistory 13(1985):3-12,' Barbara Finkelstein, ed., Regulafed
Children/Liberated Children: Education in Psychohistoricat
Perspective. New York: Psychohistory Press 1979
69. Barbara Finkelstein, "In Fear of Childhood,"
pp.321-2.
70. Ardyce Masters, "The Doll as Delegate and
Disguise," The Journal of Psychohistory I3(1986):293-307
71. Elizabeth Pleck, Domestic Tyranny: The Making ofAmerican
Sodal Policy Against Family Violencefrom Colonial Times to the
Present, New York: Oxford University Press, 1987, p.46.
72, Roger Thompson, "Popular Attitudes Towards Children in
Middlesex County, Massachusetts, 1649-1699," The Journal of
Psychohistory 13(1985):146.
73. Ibid, p. 156.
74. Joseph F. Illick, "Does the History of Childhood Have a
Future?" The Journal of Psychohistory I 3(19851:159-70.
75. Aurel Ende, "Comment," The Journal of Psychohistory
t3(1985):l74.
76. Besides The History of Childhood and Histor;;' and Childhood
in America, the Psychohistory Press also published in the field
of childhood history: Lloyd deMauc, ed., The :\Yw Psychohistory
(1975); Helm Stierlin, Adolf flit/cr: A Family Perspec-ut-c
(1976)'. Barbara Finkelstein, ed., Regulated
CItildretr/Lil)erated Children: Edttco-ton in
Psyc.hohistoricalPerspective(1979); and Vivian Fox and Martin
Quiti, Loving, Parenting and Dying: Dre Patnily C,r'c.le in
England and Attrerica, Past and Present, (1980).
77. Joseph Itlick, "Does the History of Childhood Have a
Future?" p. 165.
78. See sources cited in footnote 122, Lloyd deMause, "The
Evolution of Childhood,'' in deMause, ed., The history of
Childhood, p.62, plus Tertullian, Apcflogy, 2-4, 7-9, and his Ad
Nationes, 1,7, 10. Also see extensive sources in G.
Charles-Picard, Les religions de l'AJr'ique antique, Paris 1954.
79 l.a'~rcnce E. Stager and Samuel R. Wolff, "Child
Sacrifice at Carthage: Religious Rite or Population
Control?" Bil,h',al Archaeology flerdew, January/February
1984, p.31-SI; PG. Mosca, Child Sacrifict in Canaanite and
Israelite Religion.' A Study in Malk and Molech, Ph.D.
dissertation, Harvard University, 1975: L.E. Stager, "The
Rite of Child Sacrifice at Carthage" in i.G. Pedley, ed.,
New Light on Ancient Car-thage. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan
Press, 1980; M. Weinfeld, "The Worship of Moleeb and of the
Queen of Heaven and Its Background," Ugan't-Forsc.hrttrgen
4(1972):133-i54; Malcolm W. Browne. "Relics of Carthage Show
Brutality Amid the Good Life," The New York Times, September
1,1987, pp. Cl, C3.
80. Peter Warren, "Knossos: New Excavations and
Discoveries," Archaeology, July/August 1984, pp. 47~55.
SI. Emil Eyben, ''Family Plannin8 in Antiquity." trans. by
P. Van Dessel,Ancientsocie-ty I l/l2(1980/1981):5-82. Also see
E.E. Vardiman, Die Frau in der Artik,. Sit-tcngeschichie der Frau
im Altertuert. Wien-Duesseldorf: Leon, 1982.
82. Henry Ebel, "The Evolution of Childhood
Reconsidered," The Journal of Psychohistory 5(1977):67-s0.
83. Ibid, p, 67,.
84. Ibid, pp.71 and 76.
85. Ibid, p.77
86. Lloyd deMause, "The Evolution of Chitethood," in
deMause, ed., The History of Childhood. New York: Psychohistory
Press, 1974, p.3,
87. Peter Petschauer, ''Growing Up Fetnale in Eighteenth-Century
Germany," The Jour-nalofPsychohistory t1(1983):181;
"Children of Afers, or 'Evolution of Childhood'
Revisited," The Journal ofPsychohistory l3(1985):138.
88. Petschauer, "Children of Aters," pp. 121-44.
89. Lloyd deMause, "Evolution of Childhood," pp.32-35.
90. Peter Petschauer, ''Intrusive to Socializaing Modes:
Transitions in Eighteenth-Century Germany and Twentieth-Century
Italy," The Journal of Psychohistory
14(1987):257-70.
91. ibid, p.259
92. Ibid, p.260.
93. The reason I have yet to address these questions
ofdifferential evolution ofchildrear-mg practices (first
approached in my article "The Formation or the American
Per-sonality Through Psychospeciation," Foundations of
Psychohistory, New York:
Creative Roots, 1982, pp.105-131) is that, unlike Darwin, I had
no Linnacus available to devise classifications. Only now that a
rough outline or childrearing stages is emerg-mg can one begin to
set out evolttrionary mechanisms affecting psychospeciat ion and
begin to explain why some groups are still eating their babies,
as Paleolithic man did, and some are empathic toward them and
help them grow up to mature adults.
94. Alice Miller, Prisoners of Childhood. New York: Basic Books,
1981 (Published in paperback as The Drama of the Gifted Child);
Alice Miller, For Your Own Good:
hidden Critelty in Child-Rearing and rho Roots of Violence. New
York: Far-rar/Straus/Giroux, 1983; Alice Miller, Thou StraIt Not
Be A ware.' Society's Betrayal of the Cit lid. New York:
Farrar/Straus/Girou~, 1984.
95. Alice Miller, For Your Own Good, p.62.
96. Katharina Rutschky, ed., Schwar;e Paedogogik: Quellen zur
i\'aturgeschichte der
batergerlichen Erziehung. Frankfurt/Ntain-Berlin-W Len: Ullstein
Buecher, 977;
Katharina Rutschky, Deutsche Kinder-Chrc)nik: IVunsch- und
Schrakens.bilder aus
var Jahrhunderten. Koeln: Kiepenheuer & Witsch, 1983.
97. Kaiharina Rutschky, Deutsche Kinder-Chronik, pp. xxx-xxxni.
98. Friedhelrn Nyssen, ''Geschichte der Kindheit ails Schwarze
Paedgogik? Zu Katharina Rntschkys Kritik an L.. deMause,"
Jahrbucls der Kinclheit 4(l987):55-66.
99. See Aurel Ende's review of the recent litcraturc in his
''Children in History: A. Per-sonal Review of the Past Decade's
Priblished Research," The Jounral of Psychohistory I
l(1983):6S-88.
lOt). Klaus Arnold, Kind und Gesellschaft in Mittetalter 'and
Rertaissarice. Paderborn: Fer-dinand Schoeningh, 1980, p.14.
Arnold appears to have misread my "Evolution" ar-ticle
and betieves I said all children today were being raised in the
"helping mode." See review of Arnold's book by Peter
Petschauer, The Journal of Psychohistory 12(1984):259-il. Other
works doubting improvement in childhood can be found discussed in
Aurel Ende, "Children in History: A Personal Review of the
Past Decade's Published Research," The Journal
ofRsychohisfory I l(1983):63-88.
101. Linda A. PolLock, Forgotten Children: Parent-(::hild
Relations from 1500 to 1900. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1983.
102. Review of Pollack by John R. Gillis, Journal of
InterdisctpIinary History l6(1985):142-44.
103. Review of Pollaelt by Peter K. Smith, Bulletin of the
British Psychological Society (1984):1S8.
104. Review or Pollock by Sophie Freud, Dynamic Psychotherapy
4(1986)'.92,
los. Review of Pollaek in the Journal Of the History of the
Behavioral Sciences
22(1986):259.
106. She does devote three pages to newspaper reports, but only
uses them to conclude that "parents could not treat their
children exactLy as they pleased, even when there was no specific
law to protect children." (p.95)
107. Ibid, p. 172.
108. "The fl'nal list of sources was checked against those
in Linda Pollock's Forgotten Children . . - to Insure that every
source she examined had been included." Elizabeth Fleck,
Domestic Tyranny: The Making of American Social Policy Against
Family Violence From Colonial Times to the Present. New York:
Oxford University Press, 1987, p. 205.
109. Ibid, p.237.
110. Linda Pollock, Forgotten Children, pp.199, 268. Besides the
dependence only on the reports of the parents and the use of
argutnenlum cx silenho, Polleck uses other means to distort what
she found, such as: the substitution of her word
"smack" for parents who used the word "whip"
(e.g., p.174,175),' the selective use ofevidence, as when she
says Witliarn Byrd was "against harsh discipline"
because he once said he thought his wife too cruel to his niece,
though another time, which Pollock does not relate, he often
whipped her himself and once forced her to "drink a pint of
piss" (p. 152'. Byrd's statement can be found in his diary
for 8 October 1710; for a full discus-sion or Byrd as a parent,
see john F. Walzer, ''A Period of Ambivalence: Eighteenth-Century
American Childhood," in Lloyd deMause, The Hisrory of
Childhood, pp. 351-382); her odd practice throughout the book or
labeling a diarist by the date of his or her birth, rather than
by the time they wrote, so that, for instance, M. Woods
(1748-1821) writes in the late 18th century but is included in
the period 170049 by Pollock, thus having the affect of making
all statements seem evidence for conditions
a full generation earlier than they were (p.156). She also, like
most critics, distons my thesis by presenting it as though I said
that all parents in every century were acting in the same
childrearing mode-so that everyone today is part of the helping
mode and totally empathic to their children-whereas I actually
said previous childrearing modes persist in later periods, so
that all six modes can be found among today's
parents.
Ill. Aurel Ende, "Children in History: A Personal Review of
the Past Decade's Published Research," The Journal of
Psychohistory 11 (1983):73.
112. Philip Creven, The Protestant Te~npera,r,ent: Patterns of
Child-Rearing, Rehgious Lxperience and the Self in Early
Atrierica. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1977, pp
265-70.
113. l~twrcncc Stone, The lamely, Sex and Marriage in England
1500-1800. New York:
Ilarper & Row, 1977, p.758. For excellent reviews of the
shortcomings of Stone's book and his misuse of primary sources,
see Seymour Byman, "Psychohistory At-tacked," The
Journal of Psychohistory 5(1978):575-586 and Vivian Fox,
"Comment" Ibid, 587-597.
114. Lawrence Stone, "The Massacre of the Innocents,"
The New York Review oJBooks, November 14, 1974, p. 29. Stone's
book, however, is far richer in sources for childhood than most
of the others.
15. Daniel Blake Smith, "Autonomy and Affection: Parents and
Children in Eighteenth-Century Chesapeake Families," in
Harvey J. Graff, ed., Growing Up in America:
Historical Experiences Detroit: Wayne State University Press,
1987, p.138. Otherex-amples of books on childhood that sidestep
the emotional life of children which have been published since
our book include Edward Shorter, The Making of the Modern
Fattidy. New York: Basic Books, 1975; Ingeborg Weber-Kellermann,
Die Kindheu:
ICine Kulturgesthidite Frankfurt/M,: Insel Veriag, 1979;
Jean-Louis Flandrin. l~'atiiihes in I'ortirer Times;' Kinship,
Ilouseholc£ and Sexuality. Cambridge: Cam-bridge University
l~ress, 1979; Datuel Blake Smith, Inside the Great house: Planter
l"aiiiily Life if, Eighteenth-c 'entury C'hesapeake
Society.. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1980; Wilhelm
Theopold, Das Kind in der Votivmalerei. Munchen: Verlag Kral
Thiemig, 1981; Ferdinand Mount, The Subversive Family: An
Alternative History of Love and Marriage. London: Jonathan Cape,
1982; C. John Sommerville, The Rise and Fall of Childhood. New
York: Sage Publications, 1982; Keith Wrightson, English Society
1580-1680. New Brunswick: Rutgers Univtrsity Press, 1982; James
Waln'n, A Child's World: A Society History of English Childhood,
18OO~I9J4. London:
Penguin, 1982; Steven Ozment, When Fathers Ruled: Family Life in
Reformation Europe. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1983;
Stephen Wilson, "The Myth of Motherhood a Myth: The
Historical View of European Child-Rearing," Social History
9(1984):181-198; N. Ray Hiner and Joseph M. Hawes, Growing Up in
Atnerica: Children in Historical Perspective, Urbana: University
of Illinois Press, 1985; Alan Macfarlane, Marriage and Love in
England: Modes of Reproduction
1300-1840. London: Blackwell, 1986; John Gillis, For Better, For
Worse: British Mar-riages 1600 to the Present. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1986.
In contrast, Elizabeth Wirth Marvick's excellent Louis XIIP The
Making of a King (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986),
although it does not address itself to ques-tions of historical
change because it is only about a single child, is an important
excep-tion to the Scotomizing of unpleasant facts from which the
other works mentioned above suffer. Similarly, Elisabeth
Badinter's Mother Love: Myth & ReaIity-Moth~r~ hood in Modern
History (New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., 1980) is an
excellent source for French childhood history, although her
overall theory that mother love suddenly was invented only
because the child had acquired a "commercial value" is
an unfortunate one. Similarly. Jonathan Gathorne-Ilardy's The
Rise and Fall of the British Nanny (London: Hodder and Stoughton,
1972) and Ronald Pearsall's ~Wht's Black Angels: The Forms and
Facrs of Victoria,, Cruelty (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1975)
have excellent material on British childhood in the nineteenth
cen-tury.
116. Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962.
Ii?. Anew publisher for The History ofChddhood has just reprinted
it in hardcover and paperback editions: Peter Bedrick Books (New
York), 1988.
118. Florence Rush, The Best Kept Secret: Sexual Abuse of
Children. Engrewood Cliffs:
Prentice-flail, 1980. Although Rush apparently wrote this book
without having discovered any of our work on the history of
sexual abuse, ii is an excellent piece of historical detective
work in an impossibly difficult held.
119 Gerald M. Edelman, Neural Darwinism: The theory of Neuronal
Group Selection, New York: Basic Books, 1987. If Edelman is
correct, then the evolution or childhood not only determines the
way we see the world (an adult who was swaddLed as a baby sees a
different world than one which had been allowed freedom) but also
determines the actual anatomy of our brain (an aduLt who was
swaddled as a baby has quite dif-ferent neural structures than
one who was free). For the conjunction of Freud and Edelman, see
Israel Rosenfield The Invention of Memory: A New View of the
Brain. New York: Basic Books, 1988.
Special Issue
"On Writing Childhood History"
The Journal of Psychohistory 16 (2) Fall 1988
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