ABSTRACT
Discussions between parents and children are a hallmark of middle-class child rearing. Middle-class parents tend to adopt a cultural logic of child rearing that stresses the concerted cultivation of children. The working-class and poor children showed an emerging sense of constraint in their interactions in institutional settings. In the accomplishment of natural growth, children experience long stretches of leisure time, child-initiated play, clear boundaries between adults and children, and daily interactions with kin. Professionals who work with children, such as teachers, doctors, and counselors, generally agree about how children should be raised. Of course, from time to time they may disagree on the ways standards should be enacted for an individual child or family. Public discourse in America typically presents the life accomplishments of a person as the result of her or his individual qualities. Americans are much more comfortable recognizing the power of individual initiative than recognizing the power of social class.
