Around the Crib

Around the Web has to sit at the kids’ table this holiday. And to mark the occasion here’s a special Christmas song from my family to yours. As I head home to Texas I reflect on how kinship is an amazing thing. Let’s just say kids, through their own magic, give holidays a new meaning.

Twins!

Kids say the darndest things

  • Society for Linguistic Anthropology links to two NYT artices, one on the latest research on baby babbling the other testing whether very young children can understand irony.
  • Language Log responds to a NYT piece on linguist Deborah Tannen’s current research on why having a sister makes you happy.

Early development

  • Time reports on recent psychological research that shows a direct relationship between affection given to very young children and the display of kindness by those chidlren later in life.
  • Slate emplores you to make sure those kiddie get plenty of playtime on their tummies. “A growing body of evidence now suggests that the timing of the motor-skill milestones that precede walking is crucial and can even factor into long-term health and cognitive ability.”

Youth education

  • Sociological Images questions whether boys receive less sex education than girls.
  • Here’s a program that seems ripe for anthropological study: bringing babies into the classroom to teach teens compassion.

Health

  • Somatosphere reviews the latest issue of Transcultural Psychiatry a special issue on “Child and community mental health in cultural perspective.”
  • Mind Hacks reveals that a major textbook for doctors on treating mental illness in children authored by two prominent psychologists was, in fact, ghost written. By a drug company.

Parenting

Seen something around the web that you’d like to share with the Savage Minds community? Email me at mdthomps AT odu.edu

Matt Thompson

Matt Thompson is Project Cataloger at The Mariners’ Museum in Newport News, Virginia, and currently working on a CLIR ‘hidden collections’ grant to describe the museum’s collection of early 20th Century photography. He has a doctorate in anthropology from the University of North Carolina and a Masters in information science from the University of Tennessee.

4 thoughts on “Around the Crib

  1. I commented on Mind Hacker, as well, but I think you should really review the NYT article and its corrections about the ghostwritten textbook. I agree that this is yet another opportunity to help make transparent the marketing of health (and the misrepresentation/elision of education/commercialization), but the NYT corrections on 12/8/2010 note:
    “While documents show that SmithKline (now known as GlaxoSmithKline) hired a writing company for the book, they do not indicate that the company wrote the book for the authors, Dr. Charles B. Nemeroff and Dr. Alan F. Schatzberg. The article also described incorrectly, in some editions, events outlined in a letter from the writing company to Dr. Nemeroff. The correspondence proposed a timeline for the writing company to furnish the doctors and SmithKline with draft text and final page proofs for approval; the letter did not say that the company had already provided those materials for final approval.”

    Mind Hacker has been sensationalist in summarizing the situation, and I think it undermines those of us who do want to build a persuasive argument that there is a problem in our pharmaceutical industry.

  2. Great post, I find the anthropological gaze on parenting so useful and inspiring. Sometime ago on this blog I believe someone posted their favorite parenting books and asked for recommendations? I cannot for the life of me find that post anymore, I´ve searched for children, kids, parentings, nothing. Am I looking in the wrong blog?

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