Myra Bluebond-Langner, Ph. D.
Director
Professor II of Anthropology

J.W. (Bill) Whitlow, Ph. D.
Associate Director
Professor of Psychology

Angela Connor-Morris, MSW
Program Coordinator

Amy DeCicco
Project Coordinator

Deanne Farrell
Administrator

Barbara Klaczynska
Grants Consultant

Beth LaRata
Program Assistant

Jeanette Richetti
Office Assistant

Monika Deppen Wood, M.A.
Webmaster

Margaret Marsh, Ph. D.
Dean, Camden Campus
College of Arts and Sciences

Letter from the Director

Dear Friends and Collegues,

It's hard to believe that the Rutgers University Center for Children and Childhood Studies is just over a year old. It has been a year of tremendous accomplishments: from the inauguration of the Camden Campaign for Children's Literacy (see articles on grants recently received for the program) and our agreement with Rutgers University Press for the first book series in Childhood Studies (see article about new Editorial Board member Bambi Schieffelin), to the development of a seminar series on issues in children's health and well being (see Jon'a Meyer seminar review) and the creation of a Minor in Childhood Studies. We have built an organization with programs meeting the needs of many communities including scholars, professionals, students, children and families.

I would like to thank all the members of the Center staff for their hard work, and welcome our newest staff members, Amy DeCicco, Beth LaRatta & Jeanette Richetti. I also would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has contributed to the Center in the past year - the foundations, corporations and individuals who believe in our mission and programs. Without the support of each of our partners, we would not have come this far this quickly. I encourage each of you, as a member of our community to contact me with your thoughts and ideas to move the work of the Center forward.

We have created strong momentum and set high standards that I am certain we will continue to meet.

Regards,

 

Myra Bluebond-Langner, Ph. D.

Research Projects Receive RUCCCS Funding

Congratulations to the following RU Center for Children and Childhood Studies Associates who received funding for their research projects through the SROA Seed Money Awards Program: Stuart Charme, Professor of Religion; Janet Golden, Associate Professor of History; Jon'a Meyer, Assistant Professor of Sociology; Jane Siegel, Assistant Professor of Criminal Justice; and John Wall, Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Religion.

Dr. Charme will use his grant to complete his study on The Emerging Jewish Identities of Childhood and Adolescence. The study focuses on adolescents' experiences and attitudes about various aspects of being Jewish at a critical point in their development of self and identity.

Dr. Golden is co-authoring and co-editing the first comprehensive history of the health experiences of children and youth in the United States from the colonial period through the twentieth century. The book explores the health experiences of sick children through their own eyes. The goal is to provide an understanding of the history of health care institutions, social welfare and the family and the ways in which families, communities, health professionals and the state have addressed child health problems.

Dr. Meyer's project to explain the phenomenon of women who abandon or kill their newborns on the day they are born (neonaticide) will be advanced through in-depth interviews and historical research. She will examine the roles of denial and concealment of pregnancy in the abandonment and killing of newborns by their mothers.

Dr. Siegel's project, The Impact of Parental Criminality and Incarceration on Children, examines the adverse effects of parental incarceration that might ensue for the children as an unintended consequence of our criminal justice policies.

Dr. Wall's project, Animals and Innocents: Theological Reflections on the Meaning and Purpose of Child Rearing, while documenting less tangible areas of religious leaders' attitudes, moral perspectives, and beliefs concerning the broader ideals and purposes of child rearing, will provide greater insight into how theologians think children arrive in this world, aims of child rearing, and which persons and institutions in society hold what kinds of responsibilities for bringing such aims about.

These projects will be presented at seminars during the academic year (see seminar schedule in this issue). For more information on these projects, please contact Center Administrator Deanne Farrell at 856-225-6741.

Joe Barbarese Enchants Students with Discussions of the Harry Potter Books

Anyone who has children can tell you about the recent Harry Potter phenomena that has not only taken over bookstores and toy stores in the United States and in England, but will soon be taking over movie theaters as well. Dr. Joseph Barbarese, Assistant Professor of English at Rutgers University and an Associate of the RUCCCS, enchanted a discussion group at Rutgers in February with his insights into the wizardry that has cast an international spell over children of all ages.

Dr. Barbarese discussed the debates surrounding the assingment of the book to children. Dr. Barbara Nunney, Assistant Superintendent of Gloucester Township Middle Schools, also interested in Harry's spell, invited Dr. Barbarese to speak with middle school children about the Potter Books.

Dr. Barbarese and five students from his Children's Literature class (Terri Duffy, Franny Magee, Amy Thompson, Christopher Tracy and Robin Waterhouse) conducted workshops with students at the Glen Landing Middle School, Mullen School, and C.W. Lewis School in May.

The middle schoolers identified, through surveys, their favorite authors and the topics about which they would like to write books. They also wrote essays in response to the following statement: "Harry Potter is a unique character with many special abilities. In addition to his individuality, he has numerous friendships with a variety of people. Explain whether Harry Potter would be your friend and describe what Harry Potter would find unique about you."

The students were very enthusiastic and wanted to discuss why they feel that the morality attacks on J.K. Rowling's books are unfounded. The students also questioned why class reading lists did not include selections in which they expressed interest.

If you would like to schedule Dr. Barbarese to practice his own magic and lead a discussion group at your school, please contact him at 856-225-6556.

Jon'a Meyer is Searching for an Understanding of Mothers Who Kill Their Newborns
By: Ed Mauger, Center Volunteer

Dr. Jon'a Meyer, Assistant Professor of Sociology, prompted a spirited discussion among the Associates of the Center for Children and Childhood Studies on her detailed studies on the terrible phenomenon of infanticide. Reaching as far back as fourth century Rome when Constantine declared the killing of infants by fathers a crime, Assistant Professor Meyer traced these actions and the cultural and legal attitudes toward them through the centuries to the highly documented modern instances.

From the eighth century to the fourteenth, infanticide was rarely prosecuted. However, the large numbers of illegitimate births resulted in a great many abandoned infants. Foundling homes were opened in Milan, Florence, Rome and other cities by the Church to encourage women to save their unwanted infants.

By the early 1600's, child homicide had become a crime to be tried in the secular courts. The 1623 act in London began: "Whereas, many lewd women that have been delivered of bastard children, to avoid their shame, and to escape punishment, do secretly bury or conceal the death of their children,..."

In the 1800's, expanded newspaper coverage and novels took a more sympathetic view toward women on the low end of the economic scale, who were frequently seen as seduced by men from the upper classes.

Today's demographics show that infant abandonment is still most often found among unmarried teens afraid of the consequences of illegitimate births. Dr. Meyer's continued research will try to develop an understanding of these mothers who kill their newborns.

Bambi Schieffelin Joins the Advisory Board of the RU Press Series in Childhood Studies

The Rutgers University Press series in childhood studies will benefit from the expertise of new Advisory Board member Bambi Schieffelin. As a well-known and respected scholar in the field, Dr. Schieffelin, a Professor of Anthropology at New York University, will help bring to publication works in childhood studies that are engaging, readable and cutting edge. Dr. Schieffelin's wide ranging knowledge of language acquisition and talk of children will insure that voices of children are heard. Dr. Schieffelin shares with other members of the advisory board a commitment to increasing understanding of children and childhood throughout the world.

Dr. Shieffelin's work in linguistic anthropology include studies of language ideology, literacy, language socialization, and missionization, especially in Papua New Guinea and the Caribbean. A selection of her
publications include: Introducing Kaluli Literacy: A Chronology of Influences in Regimes of Language, edited by P. Kroskrity (SAR, 2000); The "Real" Haitian Creole: Ideology, Metalinguistics, and Orthographic Choice, co-authored with R. Doucet, in Language Ideologies: Practice and Theory, edited with K. Woolard and P. Kroskrity (Oxford University Press,1998); Language Ideology, co-authored with K. Woolard in the Annual Review of Anthropology

23, (1994); and The Give and Take of Everyday Life: Language Socialization of Kaluli Children (Cambridge University Press, 1990).

Dr. Shieffelin is the recipient of numerous grants and fellowships from the National Endowment for
The Humanities, American Council of Learned Societies, John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, Wenner-Gren Foundation, and Spencer Foundation.

For more information about the Rutgers University Press series in childhood studies, please contact Project Coordinator Amy DeCicco at 856-225-6073.

RUCCCS Welcomes Amy DeCicco as Project Coordinator

The Rutgers University Center for Children and Childhood Studies welcomes Amy DeCicco as our new Project Coordinator. Amy is a recent graduate of Rutgers University, Camden Campus with a bachelor's in sociology, a minor in anthropology with a 4.0 GPA.
Amy will serve as a project coordinator on Dr. Bluebond-Langner's study of Medical Decision Making For Children With Cancer. Her responsibilities include literature review, abstracting medical and social science articles, assisting in data coding, maintaining databases, preparing reports and overseeing the transcription of field journals and audio tapes. Amy also assists with the Rutgers University Press series in Childhood Studies and Minor in Childhood Studies.

Major Support from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation
moves the Camden Campaign for Children's Literacy Forward

The Center for Children and Childhood Studies at Rutgers University's Camden Campus has received a two-year, $500,000 grant from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation to develop and implement the Camden Campaign for Children's Literacy.

The Campaign has been designed to meet the needs of Camden's children from ages birth to five in the area of literacy. In a city where 96 percent of students are categorized as at-risk or disadvantaged and 80 percent of the children live in poverty, improving literacy levels is an important part of improving lives.

The Center for Children and Childhood Studies, together with community agencies and leaders, have identified a number of challenges to literacy in the city, including: low availability of literacy programming; a large percentage of parents, caregivers and direct care staff who need increased guidance in the area of emergent literacy; and limited resources available to the Camden City Library for additional programs and research.

"The first 1,000 days of a child's life are critical to language development," says Myra Bluebond-Langner, Director of the Center. The Center for Children and Childhood Studies, in cooperation with the Camden community, is working to address this challenge through five comprehensive initiatives.

A Blueprint for Children's Literacy in Camden will continue to develop better methods of collaboration between individuals and organizations working on literacy issues and help to insure effective use of community resources, including the publication and distribution of a literacy guide.

The Prescription for Reading Program includes Camden health care providers in local literacy efforts by: placing readers in clinic waiting rooms; encouraging clinical staff to discuss with caregivers the importance of reading to children; and giving books to children at each well-child visit.

The Parental Literacy Program trains physicians and nurses to identify the literacy needs of parents, approach those parents in a sensitive manner, and refer interested individuals to the Literacy Volunteers of America for tutoring.

The Camden Library Outreach Initiative helps to develop and implement programs that inspire interest in reading and the use of the library for work and play.

The Child Care Literacy Training Program provides home and institutional day care staff with education and training to advance and encourage early literacy. The Camden Campaign for Children's Literacy and the community recognize that childcare providers have a unique opportunity to maximize language and vocabulary development during the early years of a child's life.

The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation promotes excellence in journalism worldwide and invests in the vitality of 26 U.S. communities. For more information or to become involved with the Camden Campaign for Children's Literacy, please contact Program Coordinator Angela Connor-Morris at 856-225-6741.

RUCCCS Receives $25,000 from Annie E. Casey Foundation

The RUCCCS has received a $25,000 grant from the Annie E. Casey Foundation. Funding will be used for two major components within the Camden Campaign for Children's Literacy. One, the Blueprint for Children's Literacy, focuses on developing better methods of collaboration among those working on literacy issues. The other, the Child Care Literacy Training Program, provides training to day care staff in how to advance early literacy. These projects were selected for funding by the foundation because of their impact on a large number of Camden organizations and individuals.

For more information or to become involved with the Camden Campaign for Children's Literacy, please contact Program Coordinator Angela Connor-Morris at 856-225-6741.

Support for the
Rutgers University
Center for Children and Childhood Studies

The Rutgers University Center for Children and Childhood Studies gratefully acknowledges the support we have received from individuals, corporations, foundations, state and federal agencies. Contributions and grants are used to support various research, service and outreach programs, undergraduate and graduate education in childhood studies, as well as Center operations.

Funder Listing

Individual Donors
Robert & Camille Andrews
Anonymous
Sharon Beales
Deanne Farrell
The Mary B. and Alvin P. Gutman Fund
Barbara Klaczynska
Margaret Marsh
Thomas and Mary Revell
Wanda Ronner
Nancy Rosoff
Gail & Ed Snitzer
Kristen Walker

Corporations and Foundations
Annie E. Casey Foundation
Campbell Soup Company
Fannie E. Rippel Foundation
First Presbyterian Church of Haddonfield Nursery School
Hewlett-Packard
John S. and James L. Knight Foundation
Johnson & Johnson Family of Companies
Michael P. Cagno Fine Art
Rutgers University Press
Triple J. Excavation & Bioremediation
Zagara's Specialty Foods

Federal and State Agencies
Addiction Technology Transfer Centers/ Substance
and Mental Health Services Administration
Camden Board of Education
Camden Empowerment Zone Corporation
National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization
National Institutes of Health
Rutgers University
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

November 8
Janet Golden
History of the Health Experiences of Children and Youth in the United States from the Colonial Period Through the Twentieth Century

December 13
Bill Whitlow
Asthma Management and Urban Lead Education and Training Program: Using Community-Based Action Research to Enhance Intervention Success

February 14
Jane Siegel
The Impact of Parental Criminality and Incarceration on Children

March 14
Stuart Charme
The Emerging Jewish Identities of Childhood and Adolescence

April 11
Jon'a Meyer
Towards and Understanding of Women Who Kill Their Newborns

May 9
John Wall
Animals and Innocents: Theological Reflections on the Meaning and Purpose of Child Rearing

All seminars will be held in the Large Conference Room, Dean's Office, Armitage Hall on Thursdays from 12:20 to 1:20 pm. Please call Deanne Farrell at 856-225-6741 if you would like further information.