One understanding of child maltreatment is limited in that it is
based almost entirely on research and clinical experience in
Western nations. The cross-cultural record, a "natural laboratory"
of human behavior, allows a consideration of child abuse and
neglect from the perspective of a wider range of social and
environmental conditions. Each of the nine original essays in this
volume examines child-rearing practices and child maltreatment in
the context of a culture very different from our own. There is no
universal standard for optimal child rearing, nor for child abuse
and neglect. Seeking culturally appropriate definitions of child
abuse, the authors stress the socialization goals of the particular
cultural group, the intentions and beliefs of adults in the group,
and the interpretations children place on their treatment. The
authors differentiate practices such as harsh initiation rites,
severe punishment, or, conversely, many Western practices viewed as
abusive by other cultures, from idiosyncratic mistreatment by
individuals. They further distinguish idiosyncratic child abuse and
neglect form the suffering caused children, and their families, by
circumstances such as poverty, food scarcity, and disease. Though
several of the essays focus on the socioeconomic factors implicated
in the etiology of child abuse (particularly rapid socioeconomic
change), they indicate that cultural factors determine how a
society will respond to negative socioeconomic conditions. The
authors concur that while children may be exposed to considerable
hardship in these non-Western societies, harm at the hands of
individual caretakers is rare. They consider factors in the
cultural context that may act either to increase or to decrease the
likelihood of child abuse and neglect. Among these factors are the
value that a culture places on children in general, categories of
children that are more vulnerable to mistreatment, beliefs about
the developmental age capabilities of children, and, most
important, the embeddedness of child rearing in a network of kin
and community that extends beyond individual biological parents.
Contributors:Forewords by Robert B. Edgerton and C. Henry KempeOrna
R. JohnsonJill E. KorbinL. L. LangnessSara LeVineRobert
LeVineEmelie A. OlsonThomas PoffenbergerJames Ritchie Jane
RitchieHiroshi WagatsumaDavid Y. H. Wu This title is part of UC
Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of
California Press's mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest
minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist
dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed
scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology.
This title was originally published in 1981.
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