Childhoods in India

This book highlights the significance of an interdisciplinary approach to understanding children and childhoods in the Indian context. While it is recognised that multiple kinds of childhoods exist in India, policy and practice approaches to working with children are still based on a singular model of the ideal child rooted in certain Western traditions. The book challenges readers to go beyond the acknowledgement of differences to evolving alternate models to this conception of children and childhoods. Bringing together well-known scholars from history, politics, sociology, child development, paediatrics and education, the volume represents four major themes: the history and politics of childhoods; deconstructing childhoods by analysing their representations in art, mythology and culture in India; selected facets of childhoods as constructed through education and schooling; and understanding issues related to law, policy and practice, as they pertain to children and childhoods. This important book will be useful to scholars and researchers of education, especially those working in the domains of child development, sociology of education, educational psychology, public policy and South Asian studies.

T. S. Saraswathi is former Professor of Human Development and Family Studies, Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda, Vadodara, Gujarat, India. Shailaja Menon is Professor, School of Education, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Hyderabad, Telangana, India. Ankur Madan is Associate Professor, School of Education, Azim Premji University, Bengaluru, Karnataka, India.

List of Figures and Tables. Contributors. Foreword. Preface. Acknowledgements. Introduction I. History and Politics of Childhood 1. Colonial Modernity and the 'Child Figure': Re-configuring the Multiplicity in 'Multiple Childhoods' 2. Did Girls Have a Childhood in the Past? Mythologies, Ideologies, Histories 3. India's Children and the Brave New World II. Socio Cultural Perspectives 4. Childhood, Culture and the Social Sciences: What We Have Gained and What We maybe in the Process of Losing 5. Parent - Child Relations: Changing Contours and Emerging Trends 6. Bala Krishna: A Paradigm of Childhood Relevant to the Present Time 7. Baccha log, taali bajao: Orphans in Cinematic Imagination 8. Representing Marginalised Childhoods in Contemporary Graphic Novels and Picture Books in India III. Education and Schooling 9. Construction of Children in Indian Educational Curricular and Policy Documents (1964-2005): Implications for Education 10. Education and Gender: A Critical Analysis of Policies in India 11. Childhood as 'Risky', and Life as 'Skills': Social Implications of Psycho-educational Programmes 12. Cultures of Fear: Children in School IV. Law, Practice, and Policy 13. Right to Childhood and Equitable Access to Justice 14. The Journey of Paediatrics from Vedic to Neoteric 15. Food and Nutrition in Childhood: Ensuring Dietary Adequacy, Diversity and Choice 16. Social Policy and Research Interface: Challenges and Prospects. Epilogue Child Rights: A Dialogue. Glossary. Index