GIS Interdisciplinary Seminar: 'Educating the sociable self' - National Archives, London, 29 January 2025

GIS Sociabilités seminar The Politics of the ‘Sociable Self’: Theories and Practices (1650-1850)

Second thematic session on 'Educating the Sociable Self' - 29 January 2025 from 16:00 to 18:00 (UK time), in London at the National Archives (Kew).

Chairs: Michèle Cohen (UCL) & Mascha Hansen (Greifswald Universität)

- Géraldine Lepan - Université Paul Valéry Montpellier 3 - "L'éducation morale selon Rousseau : de la solitude de l'enfance, à l'éveil de l'humanité".

- Matthew Grenby - Newcastle University - 'Delight in Friendship: managing the sociable self in early British children’s literature'.

Abstract: We might assume that peer-to-peer friendship has always been an important and approved part of children’s lives. Perhaps it was, but the books that children read in the eighteenth century were much more dubious and questioning about this kind of sociability. This paper examines how friendship and sociability was presented and debated in British children’s literature, and considers whether a coherent set of proprieties for children’s friendship was imposed and adhered to.

Primary sources:

Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile, 'livre 4' (1762)

Sarah Fielding’s The Governess; or, Little Female Academy (1749)

Thomas Day’s The History of Sandford and Merton (1783-89)

From 14:30 to 15:30: display of TNA documents related to 18th c. education

Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87916829873?pwd=tEWolog43f5sxn75EcoQoO5tt9jEmt.1