Behnaz Amani
Childhood is often imagined as a natural, universal stage of human life-innocent, apolitical, and outside the structures of power. This book challenges that assumption. Drawing on historical, critical, and theoretical perspectives, it argues that childhood is not simply given, but constructed: a modern institution shaped through the intertwined processes of social regulation, knowledge production, and the exercise of power.Engaging with the work of Norbert Elias, Philippe Ariès, Michel Foucault, Jürgen Habermas, and Ashis Nandy, the book situates childhood within the broader history of modern subjectivity. It traces how, from the early phases of modernity, the institution of childhood functioned as a site of discipline, normalization, and socialization-organizing bodies, shaping conduct, and reproducing dominant cultural norms.Yet this history is not only one of control. From the mid-nineteenth century onward, new possibilities began to emerge within the same institution-possibilities tied to the child’s agency, imagination, and capacity for resistance. Through a close reading of literary forms, particularly fairy tales and Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, the book explores how narrative became a space where dominant representations of childhood could be both reinforced and unsettled.At stake, ultimately, is not only the meaning of childhood, but the transformation of the modern subject itself. To study childhood, this book suggests, is to confront the shifting boundaries of power, knowledge, and human freedom.
