Product Description

From New Guinea to South America, "Babies Celebrated" travels the globe to reveal how the youngest members of a family live in a wide range of places and cultures. 200+ full-color illustrations.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #667919 in Books
• Published on: 1998-10-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 250 pages

From Kirkus Reviews
Don't let the title mislead you. This is not another gathering of cute baby photographs. It is instead a stunning visual survey of the ways in which babies in traditional cultures (in the Americas, Asia, and Africa, primarily) are fed, dressed, carried, and treated. Fontanel and d'Harcourt (who also collaborated on Babies: History, Art and Folklore, 1997) provide informed, sympathetic captions to extraordinary photographs depicting such things as babies being ritually massaged; wrapped in swaddling cloths; adorned with pigments and dressed in often brilliantly colored ritual clothes to bring good fortune; carried, in baskets, net bags, and slings, on backs and in the arms of siblings or parents; and fed. Several points are inescapable: in traditional cultures, babies go where their parents goto the fields, to market, on visits. They are present almost from birth in the essential routines of these cultures. And in more traditional cultures babies are more immediately and closely integrated into society, with a greater variety of family and friends assuming some responsibility for care and protection. The range of cultures depicted (from the Kayapo of the Amazon to nomads in Tibet) is wide, and the photographs sharp, brilliant, and fascinating. -- Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Language Notes
Text: English (translation)
Original Language: French

Customer Reviews

Beautiful Babies
I value this book, not as a treatise on child care around the world, but for the exquisite photography of babies, beautifully adorned by their loving families. The text is interesting, but bare-bones support for the amazing images of infants and children from around the world. Babies from Mongolia, Tibet, China, Australia, the Arctic circle etc. are featured, being held, carried, rocked, bathed and nursed. Their faces are hauntingly beautiful. So are their clothing and toys. Such exotic accoutrements as strips of fur, twisted grass, glass and amber beads, feathers, leather and cloth are featured. This book provides aesthetic inspiration and a visual feast for the artist in me, as well as emotional connection with the endearing subjects!

All around the world...oh so different, yet the same
This book really is an eye opener to learning about birth and rituals around the world. Even if not a word had been written, the page after page, beautiful pictures of families and babies are just wonderful. It takes us out the "the norm" we are used to with our own culture, and into many other ways of life. It reminds us of the big world we live in, we all do things a little different, yet we are all sharing a common bond, humanity. This book is highly recommended for excellant photography and is an excellant teaching guide for all.

Beautiful Babies, in all cultures and situations
How do people all over the world bathe their babies, or carry them, or swaddle them? This book will show you. Beautiful pictures for cultures all across the world! Babies, babies and more babies being swaddled, carried in slings, and just generally loved by their parents and families.

The photography is stunning and the perspective it gives you is wonderful!

A fantastic book for new or expecting moms, especially those expecting their first baby (they're always fascinated by baby pictures and stories)!