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The Circulation of Children: Kinship, Adoption, and Morality in Andean Peru

Jessaca B. Leinaweaver

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Description for The Circulation of Children: Kinship, Adoption, and Morality in Andean Peru Paperback. Explores "child circulation," informal arrangements in which indigenous Andean children are sent by their parents to live in other households. This title demonstrates that such an understanding of the practice is simplistic and misleading. Series: Latin America Otherwise. Num Pages: 248 pages, 11 illustrations, 2 maps. BIC Classification: 1KLSR; JFSP1; JHMC. Category: (UP) Postgraduate, Research & Scholarly. Dimension: 232 x 158 x 17. Weight in Grams: 366.

In this vivid ethnography, Jessaca B. Leinaweaver explores “child circulation,” informal arrangements in which indigenous Andean children are sent by their parents to live in other households. At first glance, child circulation appears tantamount to child abandonment. When seen in that light, the practice is a violation of international norms regarding children’s rights, guidelines that the Peruvian state relies on in regulating legal adoptions. Leinaweaver demonstrates that such an understanding of the practice is simplistic and misleading. Her in-depth ethnographic analysis reveals child circulation to be a meaningful, pragmatic social practice for poor and indigenous Peruvians, a flexible system of kinship that has likely been part of Andean lives for centuries. Child circulation may be initiated because parents cannot care for their children, because a childless elder wants company, or because it gives a young person the opportunity to gain needed skills.

Leinaweaver provides insight into the emotional and material factors that bring together and separate indigenous Andean families in the highland city of Ayacucho. She describes how child circulation is intimately linked to survival in the city, which has had to withstand colonialism, economic isolation, and the devastating civil war unleashed by the Shining Path. Leinaweaver examines the practice from the perspective of parents who send their children to live in other households, the adults who receive them, and the children themselves. She relates child circulation to international laws and norms regarding children’s rights, adoptions, and orphans, and to Peru’s history of racial conflict and violence. Given that history, Leinaweaver maintains that it is not surprising that child circulation, a practice associated with Peru’s impoverished indigenous community, is alternately ignored, tolerated, or condemned by the state.

Product Details

Format

Paperback

Publication date

2008

Publisher

Duke University Press United States

Number of pages

248

Condition

New

Series

Latin America Otherwise

Number of Pages

248

Place of Publication

North Carolina, United States

ISBN

9780822341970

SKU

V9780822341970

Shipping Time

Usually ships in 7 to 11 working days

Ref

99-1

About Jessaca B. Leinaweaver

Jessaca B. Leinaweaver is Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Brown University.

Reviews for The Circulation of Children: Kinship, Adoption, and Morality in Andean Peru

“The Circulation of Children is a real contribution to several fields, including kinship studies and Andean studies. Jessaca B. Leinaweaver has done substantial fieldwork in an important region of South America on a topic of great current interest and lasting scholarly importance.”—Mary Weismantel, author of Cholas and Pishtacos: Stories of Race and Sex in the Andes “In this highly readable, quite original study of the practice of child circulation, Jessaca B. Leinaweaver discusses the social, economic, racial, gender, legal, and moral contours of that practice; locates it in a complex web of local, regional, and national vectors of culture and power; and offers a nuanced interpretation of it as neither entirely benevolent nor completely exploitative. Leinaweaver is respectful and empathetic, and her book is rich in ethnographic information, thick descriptions, and personal stories.”—Carlos Aguirre, author of The Criminals of Lima and Their Worlds: The Prison Experience, 1850–1935

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The Circulation of Children: Kinship, Adoption, and Morality in Andean Peru

Jessaca B. Leinaweaver

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