Childhood Archives • FreshEd

What was it like growing up and attending school in the Soviet Union and other socialist societies? Did the lived experiences of children match the official rhetoric of the state or the Western bloc? What agency did children have? My guests today are Iveta Silova and Nelli Piattoeva. Together with Zsuzsa Millei, they have a new co-edited book that explores the memories of everyday life in socialist societies, showing the multiplicity and political nature of childhood experiences.

Their memories challenge the master-narratives that have come to dominate the way we think about the Soviet Union and other Socialist societies. Ultimately, their work pushes the field of comparative education in new directions.

Iveta Silova is a professor at Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College at Arizona State University and Nelli Piattoeva is an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Education and Culture, University of Tampere, Finland.

Their new co-edited book is entitled Childhood and Schooling in (Post)Socialist Societies: Memories of Everyday Life.

Nelli Piattoevia’s photo credit: Jonne Renvall/Tampere University

Citation: Silova, Iveta & Piattoeva, Nelli, interview with Will Brehm, FreshEd, 162, podcast audio, www.freshedpodcast.com/Silova-Piattoevia.

Transcript, Translation, and Resources:

Today we talk about war and children in Japan. My guest is Sabine Frühstück, a Professor of Modern Japanese Cultural Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where she also directs the East Asia Center.

She has published a new book called Playing War: Children and the Paradoxes of Modern Militarism in Japan. It is a cultural history of the naturalized connections between childhood and militarism.

In the book, Sabine analyzes the rules and regularities of war play, from the hills and along the rivers of 19th century rural Japan to the killing fields of 21st century cyberspace. It is a timely book that addresses the red-hot debates in Japan over its imperial past, its imposed pacifism, and its creeping militarization today.

Citation: Frühstück, Sabine, interview with Will Brehm, FreshEd, 86, podcast audio, September 11, 2017. https://www.freshedpodcast.com/fruhstuck/

Transcript, translation, and resources:

Posts

Iveta Silova & Nelli Piattoeva
Childhood and Schooling in Socialist Societies

Sabine Frühstück
Playing War in Japan

A weekly podcast that makes complex ideas in educational research easily understood.

Join Our Mailing List