• Research Paper on:
    English Families During the Middle Ages

    Number of Pages: 6

     

    Summary of the research paper:

    In six pages this paper contrasts and compares Medieval English families with their twenty first century American counterparts particularly with regard to raising children. Two sources are cited in the bibliography.

    Name of Research Paper File: D0_MTmidfam.rtf

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    Unformatted Sample Text from the Research Paper:
    2.5 kids and a dog or cat thrown in for good measure. This stereotypical image persists, even in the face of the 21st Century American family, which includes single heads  of households, as well as same-sex parents. Bet that as it may, there are, however, vast differences between the American family of  the 2000s (whether it be the stereotyped one or the real one) and the English family of the 1200s and 1300s, a period commonly known in history as the Middle  Ages. This paper will examine the medieval family, particularly the children of these families, and compare it to todays average "nuclear" family  in the United States. In order to accomplish this, we will examine theories put forth in writings by sociologist Barbara Hanawalt and some of her contemporaries. Englands children  Todays children in the United States are, to put it bluntly, coddled. They have enough to eat. They generally have roofs over their heads  and are drowning in materialistic items. They are loved and cherished to the point that if a woman even yells at her child in a supermarket, someone could call Child  Protective Services on her. Spanking or any other type of corporeal discipline is frowned upon by most child experts. And when a woman practices infanticide on her children by drowning  them in a bathtub, she stands trial, is judged guilty (both by the jury, the press and most of a nation) and is punished with the death penalty.  While 21st century American children are coddled or, to use a better word, cherished, the medieval children of England were not. Sociologist Philippe Aries 

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