Comparing Stannard's 'Death And The Puritan Child'

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Death and the Puritan Child A Critical Essay Review Submitted in Partical Fulfillment of the Course Requirements of American History 2010-19 Randy Lillard 10-08-09 Stannard, David E, “Death and the Puritan Child”, 232-236. David Stannard focuses on the childhood and death of puritan children. Stannard’s article is the first to explore Puritan society’s approach to the prospect of early death. The possibility of childhood death remained an ominous reality. “He observed, as soon as the child could live without the constant solicitude of his mother, his nanny or his cradle rocker, he belonged to adult society.…show more content…
In this article the author explains his points on childhood and the death of puritan children. The author uses different points from other people to explain his point. There are a lot of different things that shows us how the Puritan children had no childhood. For example, the children wore clothes similar to adults, and they were treated such as adults. Also, he points out that the parents were not allowed to get to close to the children, showing us that the children had no type of affection. The parents were not supposed to get close with the children because in most cases the children were going to die and they wanted the parents to be able to move right along. The author uses Aries’s Centuries of Childhood: A Social History of Family Life, a study of European attitudes toward childhood. By doing this enrichment assignment it enhanced my thought of how the Puritan children were treated. I never knew that the Puritan children did not have any childhood until I took this class. By reading this essay it showed me how they were treated and what they were thought of. Most of the children died before they age of ten and by the age of seven if they were still alive they were treated as if they were adults. Reading this makes me look at the type of childhood that I had, and they type of childhood the Puritan children had. It showed me not to take anything for granted because the Puritan children did not have a

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