Industrious Children: Work and Childhood in the Nordic Countries

Children's work is a controversial subject both in the sciences of sociology and history. It does not accord well with the modern idea of a good childhood -- that children actually work. Children ought to spend their time playing and attending school. The historians' interest has focused on industrial child labour -- its emergence and its disappearance. But relatively few children worked in industry. Far more children were employed in agriculture and retail trade, if they did not help at home or at the neighbour's. Sometimes they received pay -- other times not -- and they often worked on the edge of the law. The articles in this book examine children's work from the mid-1800's and until the 1990's, because children's work is not a closed chapter in history. But the character and social function of the children's work have been changed over time. This anthology is the result of an inter-Nordic research project about children's work in the Nordic countries involving all the five Nordic countries.