The social construction of help among Danish children: the intentional act and the actual content

Abstract

This paper is based on an ethnographic study of younger Danish school children's actions and social relations during episodes of sickness and minor accidents. The focus is on how children as social actors give help to others. The main points concern first, the need for a cultural approach to distinguish between the intention and the motive of an action in order to understand children's evaluation of and communication about help. A second point concerns the recognition of children's individual actions as they combine in a collective strategy. Finally I discuss the relationship between children's cultural practices and constitutive elements of their everyday life. I specifically focus on ‘the act of looking’ and time and tempo as it relates to understanding childhood sickness and its relevance in social negotiation between children and adults. Copyright © 1993, Wiley Blackwell. All rights reserved