Product details
- ISBN 9781789973730
- Weight: 400g
- Dimensions: 152 x 229mm
- Publication Date: 14 Sep 2021
- Publisher: Peter Lang International Academic Publishers
- Publication City/Country: GB
- Product Form: Paperback
- Language: English
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Annie Skinner explores the challenges and obstacles faced by children who were removed from their families by the state in the nineteenth century. The children in this study were rescued from neglected, abusive or dangerous situations and committed to care, but in the process were criminalized and incarcerated in industrial schools until they turned sixteen. Using letters from the children, their parents and correspondence from the authorities, the author focuses on the children’s experiences of their removal. We hear first-hand how children growing up in a controlled environment learnt how to navigate their way through the tough regimes of the institutions and resisted authority. The author shows how attitudes towards children in care were dominated by the belief that removing contact with their parents was essential in order to avoid repeating a negative history. A wholly new life was needed for a healthy and secure social development. At the heart of this new life was a future in domestic service. However, here children also faced stigma from employers and authorities. Skinner positions the voice of the child at the forefront of her study by offering close readings of children’s letters, taken from source. And so she allows us to see the impact of such policies on lives, as well as their isolation as a result of removal and their search for identity.
Annie Skinner is a social historian based at Oxford Brookes University where she completed her PhD in History. Before moving into historical research she worked as a social worker with children and families and taught on the social work course. Her published work has focused on voluntary organisations’ contribution to health and social care in the nineteenth century. Annie Skinner’s research concentrates on finding the hidden, unheard and often silent voices behind these social histories. Her latest research has found the voice of the child in nineteenth-century child protection practice.
