Kate Bradley

Juvenile delinquency and the public sphere: exploring local and national discourse in England, c. 1940–69

Official statistics would appear to show that there has been a dramatic and sustained rise in crime by the young since the Second World War. Youth crime became a consistent and potent theme in public discourse at the same time. This article explores the role of discourse around juvenile delinquency in England between 1940 and 1969, looking first at governmental responses to and national press reportage of youth crime. It then uses a case study of the East End of London to explore the ways in which the local press approached the matter, along with the recollections of those who grew up in the area at the time. It concludes that discourse at a national level tackled juvenile delinquency as an abstract, theoretical entity, often detached from the daily experience of youthful misbehaviour. In sharp contrast, the local East London newspapers were not preoccupied with concerns over a decline in the behaviour of young people in the area, and autobiographical accounts likewise suggest much continuity. The article argues that, if we want to understand changes in the behaviour of young people over time, the focus should on experiences on the ground.

'Growing up with a City': Exploring Settlement Youth Work in London and Chicago, c. 1880–1940

Abstract The first university settlements were founded in East London in 1884, bringing young graduates to the area to live and to work for the benefit of impoverished local communities. The settlement model was soon adopted by social reformers around the world. This article considers the question of whether settlements should be seen by historians as a coherent body with shared values, or as institutions whose character and interests were uniquely shaped by their local neighbourhoods — and thus what the study of individual settlements can contribute to our understanding of working-class life in East London and elsewhere. This is examined through a comparative study of settlements in London and Chicago and their work with children and young people. This article also considers how settlements attempted to develop associational cultures and social capital among children and young people.

History in the UK National Curriculum: A Discussion

ABSTRACT In response to recent discussions in the UK about the history national curriculum in schools, Cultural and Social History invited several historians to comment on the issues. Their responses to our questions have been interleaved and lightly edited.

Review - Teenage pregnancy: What's the problem?

Review of Simon Duncan, Rosalind Edwards and Claire Alexander (eds), Teenage Parenthood: What’s the Problem? (Tufnell Press, 2010)

Women and Justice for the Poor: a history of legal aid, 1863–1945, Felice Batlan

The central premise of Women and Justice for the Poor is that the history of legal aid in the United States has generally been understood through the lens of how a male-dominated profession extende...

Women and Justice for the Poor: a history of legal aid, 1863–1945FELICE BATLAN

The central premise of Women and Justice for the Poor is that the history of legal aid in the United States has generally been understood through the lens of how a male-dominated profession extende...

Review of Felice Batlan, Women and Justice for the Poor: A History of Legal Aid, 1863-1945

The central premise of Women and Justice for the Poor is that the history of legal aid in the United States has generally been understood through the lens of how a male-dominated profession extende...

Philanthropy and Settler Colonialism, by Anne O'Brien

Enlightenment’ (or did John Locke write the Magna Carta?). It is thwarted too by the authors’ choice to channel their conversation through the work of the Indian social and cultural critic Ashis Nandy. Nandy is a major voice in understanding the relationship between the coloniser and the colonised— and Nandy sees colonialism as the violent arm of Western modernity, and behind that modernity he sees the Enlightenment, within which he includes Christianity and ‘history’, which indicates how Nandy uses Enlightenment as shorthand. One reason the authors give for turning to Nandy is the similarity they claim between Australia and India, even stating that Australia, like India, is part of Asia, which is news to me—I’ve never seen a definition of Asia that includes Australia. This geographical confusion points to the volume’s basic flaw. Settler/migrant Australia has never been colonised, it is an act of colonisation. Yet throughout, while acknowledging cursorily that it is a settler colony, the authors talk of settler/migrant Australia as if colonised. They manage this by having a view of Australian foundations that rarely goes far from the penal colony at Port Jackson. This has two advantages for their purpose: the foundation is set within the ‘Age of Enlightenment’ and the Australian settler is seen as unfree and subaltern—Nandy clearly agrees (47). But this is a caricature of Australian colonial history. The prison colony was swamped by the pastoral rush of the 1830s (and that by the gold rushes of the 1850s). The pastoralists were free settlers, financed by British capital, their overwhelming ‘idea’ was greed, and their moral authority was the market place (which was not invented by Adam Smith). If these pastoralists saw themselves within ‘history’ they saw themselves not as part of ‘progress’ but as forces of Providence, that is the word you will find in their journals. It is in the 1830s, 1850s and 1890s that one will find the foundations of Australian culture. The authors look for the legacy of Enlightenment values in three ‘discrete moments’ in Australian history: the attempted Anti-Chinese NSW Act of 1858, the Cubillo v. Commonwealth case of 2000, and the Cronulla Riot of 2005. I fail to see what fresh insights they have managed by their approach, despite their laudable intentions. It is a pity that the strictures they have placed on themselves have led them to not engage with the relevant historiography, say Settler Colonial or Whiteness studies, which would have allowed them greater nuance.

Becoming Delinquent in the Post-War Welfare State: England and Wales, 1945–;1965

Before the Second World War, the majority view of academics and practitioners in the field of juvenile justice in the UK and the US was that youthful delinquency was caused by deprivation, be that in economic, physical or emotional terms.1 These deprivations were ultimately caused by the processes of “Western modernity”, namely the inequalities of capitalism, the drive to acquire material goods and the disruption of traditional family structures and social mores. The solution to this was not to physically chastise the young or to incarcerate them, but rather to prevent future bad behaviour by addressing the problems that caused it. This canonical view of the causes of juvenile delinquency is a persistent one, as the essay by Miroslava Chavez-Garcia in this volume demonstrates.

The English in Love: The Intimate Story of an Emotional Revolution. By Claire Langhamer

The English in Love is an interrogation of English attitudes to and experiences of love in the supposed ‘golden age’ of marriage in the mid-twentieth century. Langhamer launches an important challenge to the idea that the so-called ‘Swinging Sixties’ sparked a massive change in English sexual and romantic mores, replacing a staid, Brief Encounter-like chasteness with sexual liberalism. Rather, as Langhamer demonstrates, improvements in living standards meant that finding a partner who would contribute to the long-term stability of the family unit became less important and other wants – such as an exciting, physically attractive partner – could be sought. Whilst those who placed adverts in ‘lonely hearts’ sections often still wanted a woman to be a homemaker and a man to be a breadwinner, the potential for excitement and sexual self-fulfilment shifted from being desirable to essential. The media provided an array of projections of what love and relationships should be like. For example, Langhamer explores the ways in which comic strips and problem-page advice conveyed normative ideas about gender roles and the balance to be struck between freedom of self-expression and one’s responsibilities. However, the letters written in to agony aunts came from people who were at a loss as to how to proceed in their personal lives – love at mid-century was not necessarily easy and straightforward. The English in Love is also concerned with people wanting to be in love and those falling out of love. Langhamer draws out the growth of the dating agency and the lonely hearts section as a means of enabling single people to meet potential partners. Central to this dating industry was the idea that there was a ‘perfect’ match that could be found. Although social mobility was possible through ‘marrying up’, class remained important in the choice of a partner, as many people aimed to find someone with similar manners to themselves. On the other hand, marriage across religious lines became more common as the century progressed, with less division between different branches of Christianity in particular; likewise differences in race and ethnicity became less of an obstacle to potential couples over time. Not all ideal partners remained such, and Langhamer explores the ways in which people negotiated setting up new relationships as their older ones failed, including resorting to divorce, which became increasingly accessible and acceptable. Marriage, however, remained the dominant norm, and cohabiting couples often used strategies such as changing the woman’s name by deed poll to present the image of respectable marriage when an actual marriage would be bigamous for at least one of the two parties, for example. B O O K R EV IE W S