"Atlantic Childhoods, Global Contexts" in special issue of Atlantic Studies: Global Currents, 11 (4)
This article is an introduction to the special issue dedicated to exploring the ways in which childhood and youth have been shaped by Atlantic and global dynamics. It explores some of the methodological and theoretical challenges of writing a history of childhood and youth in the Global South. The authors suggest that current theories which address the experiences of young people do not adequately consider the historical specificities of childhood and youth in colonial contexts. In particular, they maintain that there are at least four distinctive factors that shaped young people's experiences. These include the racialization of childhood and youth, attempts to reshape the boundaries of childhood and youth to reflect the priorities of colonial states, the existence of colonial narratives which articulated childhood and youth in terms of deviance and pathology, and the presence of non-Western notions about young people which acted in opposition to colonial impositions despite the severity of the power imbalance.
Audra A. Diptee is an associate professor in the Department of History at Carleton University where she is cross-appointed with Latin American and Caribbean Studies and the Institute of African Studies.
Other publications from this author include:
- "Notions of African Childhood in Abolitionist Discourses: Colonial and Post-Colonial Humanitarianism in the Fight Against Child Slavery" in Child Slavery Before & After Emancipation (2016)
- "The Problem of Modern Day Slavery: Is Critical Applied History the Answer?" in Slavery & Abolition, 39 (2), 405-428 (2016)
- Remembering Africa & Its Diasporas: Memory, Public History & Representations of the Past (2012)
- "Children in Colonial Africa" in special issue of the Journal of Family History, 35 (1) (2010)
- From Africa to Jamaica: The Making of an Atlantic Slave Society, 1775-1807 (2010)