About 90 seconds a day. University of Utah anthropologist
Karen Leslie Kramer, who has spent 30 years studying Maya villagers in the Yucatan and Pume hunter-gatherers in South America, came up with that estimate. “The opportunities for learning are everywhere,” Kramer says. “It doesn’t have to be in a formal environment. Kids are like sponges—they just absorb what’s around them.”
Kids in traditional societies spend plenty of time playing, away from the adults. But they are also often among the grown-ups, watching what they do, eavesdropping, and helping out.
Then they take that information and use it to build skills such as weaving. “In many traditional societies,” Kramer says, “one of the important things to learn is how to weave, because, without plastic, we rely on [woven] containers for so much of what we do.”
This story is from the July 2022 edition of Reason magazine.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the July 2022 edition of Reason magazine.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
CULTURE WARRIOR IN CHIEF
THE MODERN PRESIDENCY IS A DIVIDER, NOT A UNITER. IT HAS BECOME FAR TOO POWERFUL TO BE ANYTHING ELSE.
HOW CAPITALISM BEAT COMMUNISM IN VIETNAM
IT ONLY TOOK A GENERATION TO GO FROM RATION CARDS TO EXPORTING ELECTRONICS.
WHAT IF AMERICA RUNS OUT OF BOMBS?
DUE TO OVERZEALOUS INTERVENTIONISM, THE U.S. 1S DISPENSING MUNITIONS FASTER THAN THEY CAN BE REPLACED.
GODZILLA MINUS ONE
The beginning of Godzilla Minus One, the latest installment in the 70-year series of kaiju flicks made by the Japanese production company Toho, upends one part of the usual formula: Tokyo is already a smoldering wasteland.
Predictably, No Progress on Global Emissions
EIGHT YEARS AFTER the Paris climate agreement, where do we stand on global emissions? The title of a new United Nations Environment Programme report sums the situation up: Broken Record: Temperatures hit new highs, yet world fails to cut emissions (again).
The Revolting Mr. Taxpayer
THOUGH ANIMUS TOWARD tax increases was a key reason for the American Revolution, historians have not shown much interest in the topic in other contexts. One reason may be that the history of tax revolts, much like the history of mutual aid or of nonunion workers during strikes, cannot easily be subsumed under the most popular analytical categories, such as economic class. So Linda Upham-Bornstein's \"Mr. Taxpayer versus Mr. Tax Spender\": Taxpayers' Associations, Pocketbook Politics, and the Law During the Great Depression is a welcome sign.
REEXAMINING THE REALIGNMENT
CAN FREE MARKETS WIN VOTES IN THE NEW GOP?
Indonesia's Free Market 'Superblocks'
YOU DON’T NEED CENTRAL PLANNERS TO GET PEDESTRIAN-FRIENDLY URBAN DESIGN.
THE LAST LIBERAL
Bill Maher on weed, wokeness, and 30 years of free speech
THE REAL STUDENT LOAN CRISIS
MISLED BY A BAD LAW, GRADUATE STUDENTS ARE DROWNING IN DEBT.