Kinderen in de achttiende eeuw Dromen beelden en sporen

This introduction repositions childhood as an indispensable lens for the long eighteenth century. It argues that age – together with gender, class, and race – organizes power, authorizes knowledge and regulates bodies. Confronting the archival silence that has long consigned young people to the historiographical margins, this introduction promotes an interdisciplinary repertoire that joins literary, social, economic and colonial history to recover children’s experiences and actions. The volume is structured around four intersecting perspectives. First, an intersectional view exposes the internal stratifications of childhood. Second, a global approach traces the transcultural circulation of ideas and practices. Third, a relational analysis clarifies how adulthood, animality and commerce define the child as a category. Finally, an agency centered reading seeks the voices and strategies of young people themselves. By rejecting progress narratives of a single discovery of the child, the collection foregrounds plurality, contestation and context. Attention to age therefore recalibrates our understanding of eighteenth-century societies.