Sanitation, Medicine, and the Child Study Movement

1. Sanitation, Medicine, and the
Child Study Movement

2. Since the mid-1800s, children’s
bodies have increasingly become
spaces for medical intervention
and scientific study.

3. SANITATION

4. Why was this an issue now?

6. Group Work: American Public Health
Association
• What causes for child mortality are put
forward?
• What solutions are suggested?
• Did anything in this document surprise you?

7. City Sanitation
• In 1864 New York City conducted its first
sanitation study and found “dark, contracted,
ill-constructed, badly ventilated and disgusting
filthy housing.”
• In 1881 New York City created its first
Department of Sanitation to clean the streets
and improve public health.

9. Ann Jarvis
• Founded “Mothers’ Day Work Clubs” in 1858
to help mothers improve sanitation
• Gave lectures such as “The Great Value of
Hygiene for Women and Children”

11. Hull House

14. How might declining child mortality
change society’s conception of
childhood?

15. Uneven Declines

16. The Child Study Movement
• “It sometimes seemed as if parents regarded the nascent
stages of childhood as a necessary evil which must be
accepted with what grace they could. Therefore the gradual
realization of what infancy and childhood really were, and
the new appreciation of the fact that children’s nature and
needs should be normative and determine their treatment
in both the home and school, came almost like a new
gospel. ~ G. Stanley Hall
• Child Study Association of America,
established 1888

17. What was new about this?

18. The Content’s of Children’s Minds
When Entering School
• What was Hall studying?
• What were his findings?
• Did you notice anything that
surprised you?

19. APPLYING SCIENCE TO CHILDREN

21. • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NerS17s
C0Bg

24. MEDICINE &
DISEASE

25. • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bws4KI2
u6tk

32. Eliminating Childhood Diseases
• Measles
• Mumps
• Chicken Pox

33. Lead Paint

34. What about today?
What medical threats do children
face? What scientific questions about
children do people grapple with?

35. Autism

36. Allergies & Asthma

37. ADD/ADHD

38. Increased Opposition to Vaccinations

39. Increased Opposition to Organics &
Genetically Modified Food

40. Pushing back against the
declension narrative