Pricing the Priceless Child: The Changing Social Value of ChildrenIn this landmark book, sociologist Viviana Zelizer traces the emergence of the modern child, at once economically "useless" and emotionally "priceless," from the late 1800s to the 1930s. Having established laws removing many children from the marketplace, turn-of-the-century America was discovering new, sentimental criteria to determine a child's monetary worth. The heightened emotional status of children resulted, for example, in the legal justification of children's life insurance policies and in large damages awarded by courts to their parents in the event of death. A vivid account of changing attitudes toward children, this book dramatically illustrates the limits of economic views of life that ignore the pervasive role of social, cultural, emotional, and moral factors in our marketplace world. |
Contents
From Mobs to Memorials The Sacralization of Child Life | 22 |
From Useful to Useless Moral Conflict Over Child Labor | 56 |
From Child Labor to Child Work Redefining the Economic World of Children | 73 |
From a Proper Burial to a Proper Education The Case of Childrens Insurance | 113 |
From Wrongful Death to Wrongful Birth The Changing Legal Evaluation of Children | 138 |
Other editions - View all
Pricing the Priceless Child: The Changing Social Value of Children Viviana A. Zelizer Limited preview - 1994 |