Drawing on the work of Norbert Elias, this article will explore the informalization of the parent-child relationship as reflected in parenting literature produced in Australia in the inter-war years. Authors of this literature have placed limits on the use of violence, discourage authoritarian disciplinary methods, and promote children's independence and autonomy. It is the contention of this article that these attempts to transform child-rearing practices can be interpreted as part of what Elias called the “civilizing process,” by which a greater capacity for self-control is exacted on the part of both children and parents. It will also be argued that Elias's framework offers an alternative approach to Marxist and Foucaultian perspectives that place emphasis on social control.
M.V. Gutteridge
, The Child Growing Up (
Melbourne: Free Kindergarten Union of Victoria
, 1937), 24.
2.
In the early 1930s, the Australian Research Council for Education, in conjunction with the Victorian Council for Mental Hygiene, organized a series of public lectures on child management. These were published as Guy Springthorpe, The Young Child: A Series of Five Lectures on Child Management (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1931); and The Growing Child: A Series of Five Lectures on Child Management (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1932). The Free Kindergarten Union of Victoria also organized a series of lectures for parents. These were published as
M.V. Gutteridge
, The Child at Home (
Melbourne: Free Kindergarten Union of Victoria
, 1934);
M.V. Gutteridge
, The Child Growing Up (
Melbourne: Free Kindergarten Union of Victoria
, 1937); and
Christine M. Heinig
, The Child in the Nursery School No. 1: Guiding Behaviour (
Melbourne: David Syme
, 1938).
3.
Norbert Elias
, The Germans (
New York
: Columbia
University Press
, 1996).
4.
Norbert Elias
, The Civilizing Process (
Malden, Mass.: Blackwell
, 2000), 119.
5.
Norbert Elias
, “ The Civilizing of Parents,” in The Norbert Elias Reader , ed.
Johan Goudsblom
and
Stephen Mennell
(
Oxford: Blackwell
, 1998), 207.
6.
Harley D. Dickinson
, “
Scientific Parenthood: The Mental Hygiene Movement and the Reform of Canadian Families, 1925-1950
,” Journal of Comparative Family Studies24, no. 3 (1993): 387;
Ilene Philipson
, “
Childrearing Literature and Capitalist Industrialisation
,” Berkeley Journal of Sociology26 (1981):
57-73
;
Jacques Donzelot
,
The Policing of Families
(
London: Hutchinson
, 1980); and
Deborah Tyler
, “
Making Better Children
,” in
Child and Citizen
, ed. D. Meredyth and D. Tyler (
Brisbane
, Australia:
Institute for Cultural Policy Studies
, 1993).
7.
William E. Blatz and Helen Bott, cited in Dickinson, “Scientific Parenthood,” 6.
8.
Karl S. Bernhardt, cited in ibid., 7.
9.
Ibid., 3.
10.
Ibid., 3.
11.
Steven Seidman, cited in ibid., 3.
12.
Ibid., 8.
13.
Philipson, “Childrearing Literature,” 97.
14.
Ibid., 65.
15.
Ibid., 66.
16.
Ibid., 65.
17.
Ibid., 66.
18.
Donzelot, The Policing of Families, 49.
19.
Ibid., 103.
20.
Tyler, “Making Better Children,” 45.
21.
Foucault, cited in ibid., 53.
22.
Ibid., 42.
23.
Elias, The Civilizing Process, xiv.
24.
Ibid., 5.
25.
Ibid., ix.
26.
Ibid., 482.
27.
Ibid., 483.
28.
Ibid., 367.
29.
Ibid.
30.
Stefan Breuer
, “
The Denouements of Civilisation: Elias and Modernity
,” International Social Science Journal , no. 128 (1991): 403.
31.
Ibid., 402.
32.
Ibid.
33.
Ibid., 403.
34.
Della Casa, cited in Elias, The Civilizing Process, 117.
35.
Della Casa, cited in ibid.
36.
Elias, The Civilizing Process, 117.
37.
Elias, The Germans, 32.
38.
Breuer, “The Denouements of Civilisation,” 402.
39.
Ibid., 403.
40.
Elias, cited in ibid., 404.
41.
Elias, The Germans, 32.
42.
Cas Wouters, “Informalisation and the Civilising Process ,” in Human Figurations, ed.
Peter R. Gleichmann
,
Johan Goudsblom
, and
Hermann Korte
(
Amsterdam : Amsterdams Sociologisch Tijdschrift
, 1977), 442.
43.
Elias, The Germans, 35.
44.
Ibid., 35-36.
45.
Ibid., 37.
46.
Ibid.
47.
Wouters, “Informalisation and the Civilizing Process,” 446.
48.
Elias, “The Civilizing of Parents,” 207.
49.
Ibid.
50.
Elias, The Civilizing Process, 365.
51.
Elias, cited in Stephen Mennell, “`Individual' Action and Its `Social' Consequences in the Work of Norbert Elias,” in Gleichmann, Goudsblom, and Korte, Human Figurations, 101.
52.
Ibid.
53.
Elias, “The Civilizing of Parents,” 207.
54.
Heinig, The Child in the Nursery School No. 1, 14.
55.
K. S. Cunningham, “Why Children Are Naughty,” in Springthorpe, The Young Child, 1.
56.
Ibid., 7.
57.
John R. Williams, “The Mischief of Fear,” in Springthorpe, The Young Child, 15. 58. Ibid., 19.
58.
Ibid., 21.
59.
Ibid., 23.
60.
Ibid.
61.
Ibid., 21.
62.
Gutteridge, The Child Growing Up, 8.
63.
Cunningham, “Why Children Are Naughty,” 8.
64.
“The Mother's Page,” New Idea, April 1, 1903, 687.
65.
Harry Roberts
, The Mother's Advice Book (
London: Ward, Lock
, 1911), 77.
66.
Henry Ashby
, Health in the Nursery (
London: Longmans
, 1898),
10-11
.
67.
Roberts, The Mother's Advice Book, 78.
68.
Edith Aitken
, The Australian Mother's Own Book (
Sydney: George B. Phillip
, 1912),
81
.
69.
“The Mother's Page,” April 1, 1903 , 687.
70.
“
The Mother's Page
,” New Idea , October 1, 1902,
182
.
71.
Ibid.
72.
Roberts
, The Mother's Advice Book, 72.
73.
“The Mother's Page,” April 1, 1903 , 687.
74.
“
The Mother's Page
,” New Idea , December 1, 1902,
338
.
75.
“
The Perplexed Mother
,” Everylady's Journal, October 6, 1912,
626
.
76.
Ibid.
77.
Springthorpe
, The Young Child,
44
.
78.
Ibid.
79.
Gutteridge
, The Child Growing Up, 8.
80.
Ibid.
81.
Ibid., 9.
82.
J. Alexander Gunn
, “
The Growth ofPersonality ,” in
Springthorpe
, The Young Child ,
62
.
83.
L.J. Wrigley
, “
The Growth of Character
” in The Growing Child,
70
.
84.
M. Lush
, “
The Child in the Family
,” in The Growing Child,
7
.
85.
Ibid.
86.
Ibid., 8-9.
87.
M.V. Gutteridge
, “
Should Children Obey?
” in
Springthorpe
, The Young Child,
28-29
.
88.
Ibid., 30.
89.
Ibid.
90.
Ibid.
91.
Ibid.
92.
Ibid., 31.
93.
Gunn, “The Growth of Personality,” 61.
94.
Gutteridge, “Should Children Obey?” 33.
95.
Ibid.
96.
Cunningham, “Why Children Are Naughty,” 4.
97.
Ibid.
98.
Ibid.
99.
Springthorpe, The Young Child, 41.
100.
Ibid., 42.
101.
Ibid.
102.
Gutteridge, The Child at Home, 16.
103.
Springthorpe, The Young Child, 45.
104.
Ibid., 41.
105.
Gutteridge, The Child Growing Up, 6.
106.
Gutteridge, The Child at Home, 18.
107.
Ibid.
108.
Cunningham, “Why Children Are Naughty,” 7.
109.
Ibid.
110.
Gutteridge, The Child at Home, 18.
111.
Williams, “The Mischief of Fear,” 23.
112.
Gutteridge, The Child at Home, 18.
113.
Gutteridge, The Child Growing Up, 6.
114.
Ibid.
115.
Gutteridge, The Child at Home, 17.
116.
Ibid.
117.
Ibid.
118.
Lush, “The Child in the Family,” 8.
119.
Heinig, The Child in the Nursery School No. 1, 38.
120.
N.A. Albiston
, “
The Importance of Habit
,” in The Growing Child,
53
.
121.
Gutteridge
, The Child at Home, 23.
122.
Heinig
, The Child in the Nursery School No. 1,
39
.
