ABSTRACT

Historical sources provide a means of examining the present in light thrown from times past: looking at how things were can cause us to question how things are and bring us to a greater realisation that many of the concepts we turn to frequently today are historically specific to our own age. While many of today’s social programmes and provision have developed to meet current concerns, within a specific national, political and historic framework, they also have roots in the past. This chapter examines care and care work as we perceive these phenomena today, in their nineteenth-century manifestations.