A World of Babies
Imagined Childcare Guides for Seven Societies
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"Should babies sleep alone in cribs, or in bed with parents? Is talking to babies useful, or a waste of time? A World of Babies provides different answers to these and countless other childrearing questions, precisely because diverse communities around the world hold drastically different beliefs about parenting. While celebrating that diversity, the book also explores the challenges that poverty, globalization and violence pose for parents. Fully updated for the twenty-first century, this edition features a new introduction and eight new or revised case studies that directly address contemporary parenting challenges, from China and Peru to Israel and the West Bank. Written as imagined advice manuals to parents, the creative format of this book brings alive a rich body of knowledge that highlights many models of baby-rearing - each shaped by deeply held values and widely varying cultural contexts. Parenthood may never again seem a matter of 'common sense'" -- From the publisher.
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A charming and fun anthropological survey of child-rearing practices around the world. Here's a sampling of some of the advice from these seven societies:
- Watch out for witches. Srs everyone is so worried about witches.
- Bury the placenta. This was a popular recommendation.
- If your baby is born with teeth, kill it (!).
- If your baby's first tooth is an upper tooth, sorry, kill it as well.
- Teach your baby all the proper greetings for family members; for example, teasing grandfather with lewd comments like “old saggy balls!”
- Don't let your baby touch the ground, we are not animals!!
- Make sure the ground is the first thing your baby touches, we are very connected to the land!
- Don't bother talking to your baby, they don't understand anything anyway.
- Remember to talk to your baby all the time, they understand ALL languages.
- Make sure to start teaching your baby Bible things asap... since your baby is born in original sin.
- Your baby just came from the afterlife.
- Your baby is actually a reincarnated god.
- Your baby is a reincarnated elder.
- Your baby might be eager to “reincarnate” an elder - aka, kill a grandparent.
- Definitely feed your baby tons of breastmilk.
- But not the early breastmilk.
- And only for three months.
- Or five years.
- But definitely around two years of breastmilk. Unless it's a girl. Then three years.
- Other good foods for newborns: tea, taro, millet, medicinal leaves.
- Srs watch for witches, they are the worst.
- Remember that witches are super jealous of your gorgeous baby. So cover your baby in cow dung and remark loudly, “Have you ever seen such an ugly baby?!”
In short, I loved this book. I'm going to post it on all parenting forums whenever someone says “in the old days” or “the natural way” to do something is XYZ. I will run in and scream “BUT HAVE YOU ADEQUATELY PROTECTED YOUR BABY FROM WITCHES?”
