How do we understand, imagine and remember childhood? In what ways do cultural representations and scientific discourses meet in their ways of portraying children?
Childhood, Literature and Science aims to answer these questions by tracing how images of childhood(s) and children in Western modernity are entangled with notions of innocence and fragility, but also with sin and evilness. Indeed, this interdisciplinary collection investigates how different child figures emerge or disappear in imaginative and social representations, in the memories of adult selves, and in expert knowledge. Questions about childhood in Western modernity, culture and science are also addressed through insightful analysis of a variety of materials from the Enlightenment age to the present day - such as fiction, life narratives, visual images, scientific texts and public writings.
Analysing childhood as a discursive construction, Childhood, Literature and Science will appeal to scholars as well as undergraduate and postgraduate students interested in fields such as: Childhood Studies, History, Gender Studies, Cultural Studies, Literature and Sociology of the Family.
About the Author: Jutta Ahlbeck is a sociologist and Senior Researcher at the Department of Culture, History and Philosophy at Åbo Akademi University, Finland
Päivi Lappalainen is Professor of Finnish Literature at the University of Turku, Finland
Kati Launis is Adjunct Professor of Finnish Literature at the University of Turku, Finland
Kirsi Tuohela is Adjunct Professor of Cultural History at the University
of Turku, Finland
