In Conflicting Paths: Growing Up In America Harvey Graff examines the many different paths to adulthood youths have taken in America. Graff accomplishes this by breaking the american childhood experience into several stages to show how childhood has changed over time with the changing social environment within America. Beginning with the 17th century and ending in the 20th century Graff examines the many aspects that affect a child's social and economic growth keying on differences of gender, social class, geograghy, and ethnicity. From this book the most appealing topics for research would be from Chapter 4: "Paving the Path in the Nineteenth Century" and Chapter 5: "The Beat of Different Drummers into the Early Twentieth Century."
In "Paving the Path" (1850-1890) Graff examines pre-industrial America from the time of political turmoil before the Civil War to the 1890's and the influence of immigration. During this time there is great change occuring through our country and Graff describes the youth of this period as "sometimes embracing change, sometimes resisting it impacts, often attempting an uncomfortable balancing act."(Graff 186) This period could make for interesting study because of all the conflict that mark this time and the feeling of being lost that many of the youth expressed. Of the paths Graff discusses from this chapter the class-linked path for men would be good for a writing topic. Perhaps a look at modes of socialization and carreer preperation in schools of the time period could be interesting.
The second chapter of interest was "The Beat of Different Drummers" (1890-1920) in which Graff describes as the "historical culmination of the previous centuries's transformationof growing up."(302) This period is marked by the drastic growth of cities, buisiness, and industry within America along with changing laws involving the rights of women and children. Research into the school systems and their increased importance to the lives of children because of laws passed during the early 20th century could be interesting to look into. This could be accomplished by looking through attendence rates before and after different legislation was passed affecting school attendance and labor. Other material of interest would be records of school tests and grades and personal accounts from teachers and students of the time. I believe these time periods due to the conflict and change that occured have endless possibilities for research.
