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Kenneth Keniston

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Famous Kenneth Keniston Quotes

“In the past the intrinsic pleasures of parenthood for most American families were increased by the extrinsic economic return thatchildren brought. Today, parents have children despite their economic cost. This is a major, indeed a revolutionary, change.”

ChildrenTodayPastParentPleasureEconomicReturnCostMajorsDespiteRevolutionaryParenthoodAmerican FamilyRevolutionary Change
Book:All Our Children: The American Family Under Pressure
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“Schools, the institutions traditionally called upon to correct social inequality, are unsuited to the task; without economic opportunity to follow educational opportunity, the myth of equality can never become real. Far more than a hollow promise of future opportunity for their children, parents need jobs, income, and services. And children whose backgrounds have stunted their sense of the future need to be taught by example that they are good for more than they dared dream.”

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Book:All Our Children: The American Family Under Pressure
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“Recognizing that family self-sufficiency is a false myth, we also need to acknowledge that all today's families need help in raising children. The problem is not so much to reeducate parents but to make available the help they need and to give them enough power so that they can be effective advocates with and coordinators of the other forces that are bringing up their children.”

NeedsGivingChildrenSelfEnoughHelpingProblemTodayForceParentAvailableMythAcknowledgeRecognizingRaising ChildrenNeed HelpSelf SufficiencySufficiencyCoordinator
Author:Kenneth Keniston
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“One current reaction to change in families, for example, is the proposal for more "education for parenthood," on the theory that this training will not only teach specific skills such as how to change diapers or how to play responsively with toddlers, but will raise parents' self-confidence at the same time. The proposed cure, in short, is to reform and educate the people with the problem.”

PeopleSelfPlayProblemParentTeachExampleTheorySkillsTrainingRaisesCurrentsSelf ConfidenceReactionsCuresReformParenthoodEducateProposalDiapersToddler
Author:Kenneth Keniston
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“Parents still have primary responsibility for raising children, but they must have the power to do so in ways consistent with their children's needs and their own values.... We must address ourselves less to the criticism and reform of parents themselves than to the criticism and reform of the institutions that sap their self-esteem and power.”

WayNeedsChildrenStillsSelfValuesParentResponsibilitySelf EsteemCriticismInstitutionsEsteemReformPrimariesAddressesConsistentRaising ChildrenSap
Book:All Our Children: The American Family Under Pressure
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“Within forty years of their arrival in the Plymouth colony, the first white settlers were afraid their children had lost the dedication and religious conviction of the founding generation. Ever since, Americans have looked to the next generation not only with love and solicitude but with a good measure of anxiety, worrying whether they themselves were good parents, fearful that their children would not turn out well.”

YearsFirstsWellsChildrenTurnsNextLostParentReligiousWhiteWorryGenerationsAnxietyConvictionFortyParenthoodFearfulDedicationFoundingNext GenerationArrivalsColonyGood ParentSettlersSolicitudePlymouth
Book:All Our Children: The American Family Under Pressure
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“It is misleading to discuss recent changes in family life without emphasizing the fact that for generations some Americans have had to raise children under particularly appalling pressures. Although much of what is worrying American parents is shared by them all, the most grievous problems are those that especially afflict a large minority--the poor, the nonwhite and, in various ways, the parents of handicapped children.”

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Book:All Our Children: The American Family Under Pressure
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“Today's parents have little authority over those others with whom they share the task of raising their children. On the contrary,most parents deal with those others from a position of inferiority or helplessness. Teacher, doctors, social workers, or television producers possess more status than most parents.... As a result, the parent today isa maestro trying to conduct an orchestra of players who have never met and who play from a multitude of different scores, each in a notation the conductor cannot read.”

TryingChildrenLittlesDifferentPlayTodaySocialParentResultsDealsTeacherPlayerSharePositionTelevisionMetsAuthorityTasksDoctorsWorkersContraryProducersScoreMultitudesOrchestraHelplessnessInferiorityConductorSocial WorkerMaestro
Author:Kenneth Keniston
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“Despite the long-term reduction in familial roles and functions, we believe that parents are still the world's greatest experts about the needs of their own children. Virtually any private or public program that supports parents, effectively supports children. This principle of supporting family vitality seems to us preferable to any policy that would have the state provide children directly with what it thinks they need.”

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Book:All Our Children: The American Family Under Pressure
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