Conclusion

Abstract

In the conclusion of Childhood and Markets, I review the substantive and theoretical reasons for the work done in this book on the practice of child caring. Drawing on theoretical resources from theories of practices, and inspiration from feminist and science and technology theory, I revisit how the book has attended to, and illustrated, the ongoing processes through which this practice’s teleoaffective qualities are performed, and the implications of these qualities for the work of child caring and the sales of goods. One of the book’s main arguments has been that these qualities are essentially ways of understanding the young child, and that these lead to the whys and hows of child caring. An analytical nuance developed in the book is also highlighted. This is that the teleoaffective qualities of child caring converges around a distinct set of primary qualities: those of loving, vulnerability, purity and stimulation. However, much cultural work and contestation underlies the achievement of these homogeneous and purified qualities. I return to some of the questions asked in the book’s Introduction. This includes the argument that childhood and markets are equally generative, with both informing practices and carrying cultural weight. I also argue that future research on children, childhood, and consumer culture needs to attend more closely to children’s age, to the generational qualities of both child caring and wider understandings of children, and to the intermediating importance of love.