ABSTRACT
This chapter examines several scientific domains that have dealt with issues around childhood or parenthood. It outlines the disciplines and theoretical debates that approach the children and parents from different angles and points of interest. The chapter traces various strands of scientific debate in relation to childhood and parenthood, demonstrates a compartmentalization that created a peculiar gap in theorizing their interrelation. A new sociology of childhood developed and criticized the approach of older socialization studies that saw children as not yet adults. Similarly, the older anthropological interest in the upbringing of children as a way of establishing kinship relations and reproducing cultural values gave way to a more child-centred interest in children as actors in their own right. The chapter demonstrates an idea about proper childhood invariably entail corresponding notions of proper parenthood as transmitted in institutional settings. Negotiations in schools, kindergartens, child welfare agencies and youth courts focus on proper children and also on their upbringing by proper parents.
