When the first edition of this seminal work appeared in 1990, the sociology of childhood was only just beginning to emerge as a distinct sub-discipline. Drawing together strands of existing sociological writing about childhood and shaping them into a new paradigm, the original edition of this Routledge Classic offered a potent blend of ideas that informed, even inspired, many empirical studies of children's lives because it provided a unique lens through which to think about childhood. Featuring a collection of articles which summarised the developments in the study of a childhood across the social sciences, including history, psychology, sociology, anthropology, feminist and developmental studies, scholars and professionals from developed and developing countries world-wide shared their knowledge of having worked and of working with children. Now with a new introduction from the editors to contextualise it into the 21st century, this truly ground-breaking text which helped establish childhood studies as a distinctive field of enquiry is being republished.a
