Children's Play and Work: The Relevance of Cross-Cultural Ethnographic Research for Archaeologists

Abstract

If archaeologists want to know what children are doing, it is prudent to study the extant ethnographic record. Using representative cross-cultural samples and ethnographic data from eHRAF World Cultures, we examine both children's play and children's work. With regard to play, we explore ethnographer descriptions of types of play activities, the morphology and materials of play objects, the context of play (spatial location, environment context) and the gender and age of the children playing. With regard to work, we follow upon previous worldwide cross-cultural research by suggesting that children's work largely follows adult tasks. Since Bradley noted that there is little variation cross-culturally in the work of very young children (who do relatively little work) and older children (who almost fully replicate adult patterns), we concentrate on children aged six to ten and ask why degree of work varies markedly from society to society. We test and find cross-cultural support for the hypothesis that degree of children's contribution varies with the predominant type of subsistence.

Keywords:

• cross-cultural research
• children's play
• children's work
• childhood activities
• material culture
• archaeology

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Carol R. Ember

Carol R. Ember, Ph.D., Social Anthropology (Harvard University) is President of the Human Relations Area Files at Yale University, 755 Prospect Street, New Haven, CT 06511, USA. Email: [email protected] and Christiane M. Cunnar, M.A., Anthropology/Archaeology (University of Wyoming) is Manager, Member Services at the Human Relations Area Files at Yale University, 755 Prospect Street, New Haven, CT 06511, USA. Email: [email protected]