Synopsis
In this PowerPoint presentation I tried to provide a general idea of the period of childhood as a time of innocence and how it formed the view of a child in our modern time. Generally, a lot of parents perceive their children as innocent beings, and want to guard and protect them from the bad side of the world. On the whole, this idea of childhood innocence started in the 18th century, with the romantic discourse of childhood.
About 250 years ago, childhood has been recognised as a distinct era of human life (Rousseau, 1762). In the 18th century, a French philosopher believed that children are in need of stimulation and education (Rousseau, 1762). However, in the past, according to Christian religion children were born evil and prone to sin. Similarly, children were portrayed as incomplete, miniature adults who did not look socially, psychically or sexually innocent (Higonnet, 1998). Yet, historians claimed that even though children were considered differently in the past, this does not indicate that they were not considered as children.
Conversely, Rousseau (1762) acknowledged a romantic, also known as the innocent child, who is born pure and innocent, and is unaware of the term adulthood. During the romantic period the innocent figure of the child triggered poetry and a political discussion. At this point, it can be mentioned that during the 18th century Reynold’s painting namely; “The Age of Innocence” became the template for pictures of children from those times up to the present days.
However, it is clear that child care traditions have been changed (Aries, 1973). According to Higonnet (1998) childhood is created by society rather than a natural biological stage. Children of middle-class nuclear families lived differently from children of upper-class families. Likewise, the child who was an orphan became an important character. Thus, various societies and different class families have different thoughts of what is expected from childhood. Furthermore, the older the child is, the less socially and sexually innocent he/she is seen by an adult.
In everyday life the discourse of childhood images is absolutely important. At this point it is important to mention that in recent years the study of childhood has already become a recognized area of research and analysis. An example is the study carried out by Stainton and Stainton (1992). The same are particular documents concerning children such as the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and code of ethics (1989) which tend to operate from this romantic/innocence period. Clearly, we can admit that there has already been a visible change in the way children are visually represented in numerous forms of media and other matters. In fact, some of the media seek to care for innocence. It is essential to understand how the image of discourse can affect our children and how these children can deal with, and go through their new identities that have been made available to them through the discourse of images.