LAREAU, Annette. UNEQUAL CHILDHOODS: Class, Race, and Family Life

Abstract

LAREAU, Annette. UNEQUAL CHILDHOODS: Class, Race, and Family Life. Berkeley, CA: The University of California Press, 2003, 331 pp., $21.95 softcover and $55.00 hardcover.Unequal Childhoods is an important contribution to the literature on social class and its effects on children's upbringing and life chances. Through observation and interview in ten family based vignettes, Annette Lareau illustrates the gradual transformation of the internal dynamics of families - for both the poor and the privileged. Focusing on the daily activities and routines of families, Lareau illustrates how differential access to resources of all kinds translate into class based differences in child rearing practices, especially when interfaced with community of residence, schooling, recreational patterns and relations with extended family.Among North American families, education and skill based disparities in income and opportunity are growing along with the erosion of equalizing social supports. Forty years ago John Porter noted in The Vertical Mosaic (1965) that middle class life styles rest on the consumption of unevenly distributed values - real middle class status did not rest on gadgetry but rather the ability to consume value associated goods. Lareau suggests such goods are having a transformative impact on child rearing practices.In her formulation of parenting styles, Lareau distinguishes between the middle class preoccupation with concerted cultivation and the working class and poor belief in overseeing the natural growth of children. The former encourages children to be competitive - even with siblings, acquire expertise in multiple tasking, and learn to interact with adults and adult institutions in an instrumental fashion - with parents as back up. Overall, such children acquire a sense of entitlement absent in their working class and economically disadvantaged peers. Just as parents of their disadvantaged peers insist on authoritarian compliance, they in turn interact with schools, government services, and the like, as subordinates rather than aggressive advocates for their children.Lareau's middle and upper middle class children are involved in a broad array of extra curricular activities. Commitments to music lessons, sports teams, and academic clubs are amassed in such quantities that scheduling and participation sap the energy of children and parents. It would seem that some of Lareau's families are indeed overscheduled, with parent's lives revolving around their children's activities. Enhancing their children's Human Capital for the future seems to be the primary parental motivation, but children often enjoy these activities make friends through them, and using their own internal calculus, position themselves for the next step in social and educational development. …