Unequal Childhoods - Annette Lareau [0]
“So where does something like practical intelligence come from? . . . Perhaps the best explanation we have of this process comes from the sociologist Annette Lareau, who . . . conducted a fascinating study of a group of third graders. You might expect that if you spent such an extended period in twelve different households, what you would gather is twelve different ideas about how to raise children. . . . What Lareau found, however, is something much different.”
—Malcolm Gladwell, author of Outliers: The Story of Success
“Through rich examples from each case-study family, this book makes a compelling case for the existence of different parenting values and practices between the classes. This wonderfully descriptive text is accessible to a wide audience and would be an excellent choice for instructing students about class and family life. In addition to providing a very enjoyable starting point for reflecting on the intersections between class, race, and parenting, Unequal Childhoods can serve as the foundation for a productive conversation on the merits and dilemmas of in-depth qualitative research.”
—Amy M. Tiedemann, Contemporary Sociology:
A Journal of Reviews
“A major strength of Unequal Childhoods is the way it tackles the fact that cultural deficiency explanations are hegemonic in American national political discourse. Because of her more balanced view of class cultures, Lareau’s analysis of concerted cultivation provides a useful tool for linking analyses of cultural and social capital.”
—Carl Stempel, International Review for the Sociology of Sport
“Lareau does an excellent job of weaving into each chapter additional examples that show that her analyses are not limited to the particular family of that chapter. She makes a considerable theoretical contribution to studies of social and cultural reproduction. Annette Lareau has written an important and engaging book, one that will no doubt be used extensively by sociologists in both teaching and research.”
—Jenny M. Stuber, Teaching Sociology
“Annette Lareau explores, through detailed descriptions of child-parent interaction and parent-institutional interaction, how class shapes daily life, language use, and engagement with institutions.”
—Ethnic and Racial Studies
“In the thought-provoking Unequal Childhoods, Lareau challenges the widely held perception of America as ‘the land of opportunity’ where anyone, no matter what his or her background, can rise to great heights of achievement. This sensitive, well-balanced book is highly recommended for academic, special, and large public libraries.”
—Library Journal
“This accessible ethnographic study offers valuable insights into contemporary family life in poor, working-class, and middle-class American households. . . . A careful and interesting investigation of life in ‘the land of opportunity’ and ‘the land of inequality.’”
—PW Online Annex
“Unequal Childhoods is as exciting to read as it is depressing in its implications.” (Four stars)
—The Scotsman
“An unusually good ethnography about social class socialization, it demonstrates with excruciating clarity what has gone wrong with contemporary social theory.”
—Melvyn L. Fein, Professor of Sociology,
Kennesaw State University
“Fewer than one in five Americans think ‘race, gender, religion, or social class are very important for getting ahead in life,’ Annette Lareau tells us in her carefully researched and clearly written new book. But, as she brilliantly shows, everything from looking authority figures in the eye when you shake their hands to spending long periods in a shared space and squabbling with siblings is related to social class. This is one of the most penetrating works I have read on a topic that only grows in importance as the class gap in America widens.”
—Arlie Russell Hochschild, author of The Time Bind
and The Commercialization of Intimate Life
“Sociology at its best. In this major study, Lareau provides the tools to make sense of the frenzied middle-class obsession with their offspring