Kidworld: Childhood Studies, Global Perspectives, and Education (Rethinking Childhood)

Kidworld contributes to an emerging field of childhood studies that challenges disciplinary boundaries, in such fields as early childhood education and developmental psychology, which are limited in their beliefs and relationships with younger human beings. One role of childhood studies is to recognize the historical-, political-, and even power-oriented contexts that construct childhood, giving voice to issues that have been previously ignored and disqualified. The authors of Kidworld employ their own diverse, global perspectives to reveal the existence of and problems with globalization and marketing of the universal, modernist child. Such questions as the following are addressed: How are market-driven motives influencing the lives of (poor) children? How does the political climate of a nation affect children’s cultural, linguistic, and educational rights? Can more just representation for children be accomplished?