A World of Babies
Imagined Childcare Guides for Eight Societies

A fully revised and updated second edition of this successful guide to childcare advice in different cultures around the globe.

Alma Gottlieb (Author), Judy S. DeLoache (Author)

9781316502570, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 20 October 2016

390 pages, 16 b/w illus. 2 maps
23.4 x 15.5 x 2 cm, 0.66 kg

Review of previous edition: 'Read these pages. This is a very moving book, and a revealing one.' Jerome Bruner, New York University, and author of Child's Talk

Should babies sleep alone in cribs, or in bed with parents? Is talking to babies useful, or a waste of time? A World of Babies provides different answers to these and countless other childrearing questions, precisely because diverse communities around the world hold drastically different beliefs about parenting. While celebrating that diversity, the book also explores the challenges that poverty, globalization and violence pose for parents. Fully updated for the twenty-first century, this edition features a new introduction and eight new or revised case studies that directly address contemporary parenting challenges, from China and Peru to Israel and the West Bank. Written as imagined advice manuals to parents, the creative format of this book brings alive a rich body of knowledge that highlights many models of baby-rearing - each shaped by deeply held values and widely varying cultural contexts. Parenthood may never again seem a matter of 'common sense'.

1. Introduction: raising a world of babies, parenting in the twenty-first century Alma Gottlieb and Judy S. DeLoache
2. Never forget where you're from: raising Guinean Muslim babies in Portugal Michelle Johnson
3. From cultural revolution to childcare revolution: conflicting advice on childrearing in contemporary China Erin Raffety
4. A baby to tie you to place: childrearing advice from a Palestinian mother living under occupation Bree Akesson
5. Childrearing in the New Country: advice for immigrant mothers in Israel Deborah Golden
6. Luring your child into this life of troubled times: a Beng path for infant care in post-civil war Côte d'Ivoire Alma Gottlieb
7. From Mogadishu to Minneapolis: raising Somali children in an age of displacement Sirad Shirdon
8. Quechua or Spanish? Farm or school? New paths for Andean children in post-civil war Peru Kate Grim-Feinberg
9. 'Equal children play best': raising independent children in a Nordic welfare state Mariah Schug.

Subject Areas: Child care & upbringing [VFXC], Child & developmental psychology [JMC], Social & cultural anthropology, ethnography [JHMC]