Thoughts on the Invention of Adolescence and its Relation to Modern Education

I think the concept of adolescence (or even, childhood arguably) arose for two reasons during the industrial revolution.

First, kids and young people were working in terrible conditions. Adults were too, but their hardened bodies were able to endure more. There are plenty of stories from Manchester and Liverpool of kids working 14-16 hours a day, falling asleep and being beat, etc. In those areas at the height of the Industrial Revolution the life expectancy for a male was 17(!) Kids had always worked, but this was different. In the fields nature set the pattern: in winter people worked less; in harvest they would work more, etc. Not to mention that a child’s parents and kin would keep an eye on him or her to make sure he or she wasn’t being overworked. In factories managers answered to investors that didn’t know the workers or conditions—their goal was to maximize profits. This led to exploitation. In reaction to exploitation people invented the construct of childhood/adolescence because they knew that this was wrong and they wanted to protect the vulnerable.

The second reason is that industrialization delays the process of economic maturation. In an agrarian or hunter-gather community a boy knows all he needs to know and can do all that he will need to do somewhere between ages 12-14. Coincidently (or providentially?) this is the time he is sexually mature and ready to reproduce—i.e. a man is ready to have kids at the same time he is ready to support a family. In an industrial economy boys and girls still sexually mature at 12-14, but they are not economically mature until….when? 18 for a factory? 22 for an office job? Nigh 30 if you want to specialize as a professional. The fact is being an engineer, surgeon, or computer programmer takes a lot of training.

Add in the fact that we live in a democratic state. In a monarchy, citizens don’t have a say in policy so they don’t really need to know history, philosophy, etc.—those pursuits can be reserved for advisers of king and the specialized few that will record and transmit knowledge. But in a democracy people without knowledge (of history in particular) are far more likely to be manipulated by a demagogue.

While I don’t think that adolescence is a good construct, I see why it arose. I think the problems with education are related to this development, but slightly different.

First, we assume that all kids can equally learn if just given the chance. This is false. People have different abilities and interests (I don’t think I could have been a great basketball given the right conditions...). A lot of what we want to teach is elitist (e.g. classic literature, chemistry, trigonometry, etc.) and to expect the majority to learn and master what only the few are capable of learning and mastering is going to lead to a watering down of standards and frustration with and hatred of school.

Second, we have so little faith in parents that we assume that things not taught in the home will not be taught at all (what else explains home-ec., sex ed., health and fitness, etc.?). Chesterton defined democracy (and I’m quoting from memory, so forgive me) as “the belief that the greatest things like making laws and raising kids should be done by regular people and not experts.” I believe 110% that we need to bring responsibility for education back to the home as much as we can. Will some parents do a bad job? Yes. Does this suck? Big time. But those same parents are probably already messing their kids up. I may want to take kids away from bad parents and put them in school thinking it is in their own best interest, but in so doing I would be putting myself in the place of God who gave parents that responsibility. Moreover this would and does undoubtedly create a cascade of unintended consequences. (Note: I do think kids can and should be taken from parents in exceptional circumstances, but this is best handled on the local level, ideally with extended family, where people have the most knowledge. I also don’t think all kids should be taken from their parents because some parents are bad, which is more or less our current system—or at least the direction toward which we are heading). (Note:  In the past once things left the family at least the community, which was generally tight nit and homogeneous, used to direct things to a large degree. Even before national standards the courts have been taking this power away for them and it has produced the mess that we see around us today.)

Third, the push for state-run schools was made in large part by factory owners! The very people that were exploiting kids funded schools with the goal of making more docile workers. For example, a kid (or adult) that lives on the farm is not used to waking up at the same time, eating at the same time, doing the same repetitive things, being indoors all day, etc. (this is why Luddites and the like smashed equipment and women were hired in higher numbers—independent famers could not adjust themselves to this, they thought it was tyranny and often rebelled against factory owners and managers). School gets kids up early, gets them used to the 40 hour work week, regiments their days (you move when the bell rings whether or not you’ve learned the lesson; you have to ask for permission to relieve your bowels or bladder) and in so doing prepared them for the industrial world. Industrial barons gave money for education then like computer companies are giving money for common core today—to direct education in order to use it for their purposes. Education used to be centered around the pursuit of what is Good, True, and Beautiful. Those things don’t help to control workers or (clearly and directly) impact the bottom line.

So what to do? I don’t have any better solutions than before. In general, empower kids by giving them more responsibility and make the home the locus of education (at least at lower levels—I don’t expect all or even most parents to be able to teach physics, Pushkin, or Plato.)