You Can Help Your Country

English children's work during the Second World War

Berry Mayall and Virginia Morrow

£45.00

ISBN: 9781787356849

Publication: November 23, 2020

Hardback £45.00 Paperback £25.00 Open Access PDF £0.00

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First published in 2011, You Can Help Your Country: English children’s work during the Second World War reveals the remarkable, hidden history of children as social agents who actively participated in a national effort during a period of crisis. In praise of the book, Hugh Cunningham, celebrated author of The Invention of Childhood, wrote: ‘Think of children and the Second World War, and evacuation comes immediately to mind. Berry Mayall and Virginia Morrow have a different story to tell, one in which all the children of the nation were encouraged to contribute to the war effort. Many responded enthusiastically. Evidence from school magazines and oral testimony shows children digging for victory, working on farms, knitting comforts for the troops, collecting waste for recycling, running households. What lessons, the authors ask, does this wartime participation by children have for our own time? The answers are challenging.’

You Can Help Your Countryis a stimulating, entertaining and scholarly contribution to the history of childhood, prompting thought about childhood today and on children’s rights, as citizens, to participate in social and political life. This revised edition includes a new preface and illustrations, and offers an up-to-date reflection on the relevance of thinking historically about children’s work for global campaigns to end child labour. It is essential reading for academics, researchers and students in childhood studies, the sociology of childhood and children’s rights. Its engaging style will also appeal to anyone interested in social history and the history of the Second World War.

Praise for You Can Help Your Country

‘Mayall and Morrow have performed an enormous service, not only in broadening our perspective of children to include their economic and social contributions to the war effort... but also in exploring both the nature of childhood” and the ambiguity surrounding adult–child relations at a time of national crisis (and beyond). Where the evacuee was confined to a specific social (children’s) space, the child worker, in vacating the classroom, implicitly frequents “adulthood”. In raising questions about the nature of children/childhood, this is a timely, relevant and accessibly written book, and is an ideal text for students in education, history and sociology.’

- Professor Harry Hendrick, University of Warwick

‘Another major contribution to the sociology of childhood by two pioneers in the field. Drawing from a rich variety of previously untapped resources, including children’s own accounts of their lives during the Second World War, Mayall and Morrow document the extensive labour and other contributions to the war effort made by English children. Though focusing on a particular period of crisis... You Can Help Your Country makes a strong case for enabling children to speak for themselves, and to participate more fully in socially useful activities.’

- Sarane Spence Boocock, Rutgers University

Berry Mayall was Emerita Professor of Childhood Studies at the UCL Institute of Education.

Virginia Morrow is Visiting Professor at the UCL Institute of Education, and Research Associate for Young Lives, Department of International Development, University of Oxford.

List of figures and tables
List of abbreviations
About the authors
Preface to the revised edition
Acknowlegements

1. Starting points

2. Children in social thought between the wars

3. Earners or learners? Work and school 1900–1939

4. Children in wartime

5. Younger children’s work: Doing their bit

6. Bringing in the harvest

7. Older children’s work: Serving their country

8. Children in organisations: Working for freedom

9. Closing points

Appendix

References

Index

'You Can Help Your Country will be of particular interest to historians and sociologists of childhood as well as historians of education, but academic and lay readers alike, curious about childhood studies or WWII history, will be engaged and enlightened by the history Mayall and Morrow recount.'
The Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth

'This book shows clearly the importance of recognising that young people, given the opportunity, can willingly and usefully contribute to promoting social welfare.'
British Educational Research Journal

'As a whole, the book succeeds in enriching both the view of childhood and the life of the child during the Second World War in England, thereby inspiring the reader to further critical scrutiny of present-day notions of childhood.'
Childhood

'a good example of the history of children’s work and education from a sociological perspective.'
Cambridge Journal of Education

'a very useful addition to the literature on children and the Second World War.'
Children & Society

‘Mayall and Morrow have performed an enormous service, not only in broadening our perspective of children to include their economic and social contributions to the war effort... but also in exploring both the nature of childhood” and the ambiguity surrounding adult–child relations at a time of national crisis (and beyond). Where the evacuee was confined to a specific social (children’s) space, the child worker, in vacating the classroom, implicitly frequents “adulthood”. In raising questions about the nature of children/childhood, this is a timely, relevant and accessibly written book, and is an ideal text for students in education, history and sociology.’
Professor Harry Hendrick, University of Warwick

‘Another major contribution to the sociology of childhood by two pioneers in the field. Drawing from a rich variety of previously untapped resources, including children’s own accounts of their lives during the Second World War, Mayall and Morrow document the extensive labour and other contributions to the war effort made by English children. Though focusing on a particular period of crisis... You Can Help Your Country makes a strong case for enabling children to speak for themselves, and to participate more fully in socially useful activities.’
- Sarane Spence Boocock, Rutgers University

Format: Hardback

Edition: Revised edition

Size: 234 × 156 mm

276 Pages

B&W line drawings, B&W photo/halftones, and colour photo/halftones

ISBN: 9781787356849

Publication: November 23, 2020