Unequal Childhoods

Annette Lareau is the Stanley I. Sheerr Professor at the University of Pennsylvania. She is faculty member in the Department of Sociology with a secondary appointment in the Graduate School of Education. Lareau is the author of Home Advantage: Social Class and Parental Intervention in Elementary Education (1989; second edition, 2000), and coeditor of Social Class: How Does it Work? (2009); and Education Research on Trial: Policy Reform and the Call for Scientific Rigor (2009); and Journeys through Ethnography: Realistic Accounts of Fieldwork(1996).

• Preface to the Second Edition Acknowledgments 1. Concerted Cultivation and the Accomplishment of Natural Growth 2. Social Structure and Daily Life Part I. Organization of Daily Life 3. The Hectic Pace of Concerted Cultivation: Garrett Tallinger 4. A Child's Pace: Tyrec Taylor 5. Children's Play Is for Children: Katie Brindle Part II. Language Use 6. Developing a Child: Alexander Williams 7. Language as a Conduit for Social Life: Harold McAllister Part III. Families and Institutions 8. Concerted Cultivation in Organizational Spheres: Stacey Marshall 9. Concerted Cultivation Gone Awry: Melanie Handlon 10. Letting Educators Lead the Way: Wendy Driver 11. Beating with a Belt, Fearing "the School": Little Billy Yanelli 12. The Power and Limits of Social Class Part IV. Unequal Childhoods and Unequal Adulthoods 13. Class Differences in Parents' Information and Intervention in the Lives of Young Adults 14. Reflections on Longitudinal Ethnography and the Families' Reactions to Unequal Childhoods 15. Unequal Childhoods in Context: Results from a Quantitative Analysis Annette Lareau, Elliot Weininger, Dalton Conley, and Melissa Velez Afterword Appendix A. Methodology: Enduring Dilemmas in Fieldwork Appendix B. Theory: Understanding the Work of Pierre Bourdieu Appendix C. Supporting Tables Appendix D. Tables for the Second Edition Notes Revised Bibliography Index

“Lareau's work is well known among sociologists, but neglected by the popular media; . . . in books like Unequal Childhoods — Lareau has been able to capture the texture of inequality in America. She's described how radically child-rearing techniques in upper-middle-class homes differ from those in working-class and poor homes, and what this means for the prospects of the kids inside.”