Child Rearing and Personal Autonomy Essay

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SOCIAL SCIENCE. The topic file I upload, I upload 2 lecture outlines. *The kit reading "Individual Autonomy Social Structure" Freedom Culture. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall,1959 PP.5-14 LEE, DOROTHY.

The key social problem that Dorothy Lee is addressing is the relationship between personal autonomy and the structure and characteristics of the society of which the individual is a part. In particular, she looks at how "personal autonomy is supported by the cultural framework." As Lee points out at page 9 of her work, the relationship between personal autonomy and structure or the cultural framework, perhaps not obvious at first, is given by the way the latter determines the first.

Indeed, as her eloquent example of the Burmese novices points out, personal autonomy is often determined by the cultural framework. In other words, the individual determines his degree of personal autonomy based on the existing structure of the society he is part of. At the same time, the cultural framework sets tacit rules that determine his area of independent action.

In the same manner, successful societies and cultures appear to be able to properly and efficiently regulate individual action. On one hand, individual action is beneficial to a society, leading to progress and to the further consolidation of societal action. At the same time, however, chaos in societies are often the result of improperly understand autonomy and personal independence.

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Lee shows that this type of chaos and lawlessness is usually the result of a "structural vacuum."

In the case of the structural vacuum, it is usually an individual or group of individual that bypasses the existing cultural framework in order to expand the level of personal autonomy. Lee points out that this is usually the type of situation that eventually produces a dysfunctional society that Lee assimilates to one where lawlessness and chaos is present.

One of the most interesting examples that Lee discusses is that of child rearing. Lee looks at child rearing in the Navajo society and determines that personal autonomy is something that the Navajos groom and encourage from an early age. This is done through the education that the mother gives the children and the freedom she allows them in growing up.

This education includes not removing dangerous objects from their area, including fire or knives. The personal autonomy is shaped here through trial and error: if the child is a little hurt, he will learn from his mistake and will be able to avoid it in the future. Lee, citing another study, concludes that this makes the children more independent and ready to successfully perform tasks at an early age.

This approach to child rearing also comes to the perception that Navajos apply in their society that there is little differentiation….....

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