Cultures of Care

Chris R. Langley, Ph.D. (2012, University of Aberdeen), is Senior Lecturer in Early Modern British History at Newman University, Birmingham. He is the author of Worship, Civil War and Community, 1638–1660.

“The strengths of Langley’s work lie in its readability. The prose is engaging and the various specific examples allow for connection with the individuals living in the distant past. He takes a broad concept—‘care’—and makes it more digestible.”Charlotte Holmes, in: Scottish Historical Review, Vol. 100, No. 2 (August, 2021), pp. 287–288.“This book provides a significant step forward in early modern Scottish social history. However it also has important implications for the history of the Reformed Kirk in demonstrating that kirk sessions did not seek to marginalise, downgrade, or control informal care.” John McCallum, Nottingham Trent University. In: Scottish Church History, Vol. 50, No. 2 (2021), pp. 171–173.

• PrefaceIntroduction1 Poor Relief2 Non-Institutional Charity, Domesticity and Reformed Intervention3 Method and Sources4 Charity and the Kirk Session1 Kindness and the Parish1 Carers and Care Acts2 Petitioning2 Childcare1 Fosterage and Wet Nursing2 Childcare and Sermons3 Illegitimacy1 Parish Networks2 Fostering Bastards3 Negligence and Infanticide4 Illness1 Neighbourly and Kin Assistance2 Disciplinary Consequences3 Charming5 Disability1 Attitudes towards Disability2 Parish Stability6 Death1 Providing Deathbed Care2 Clerics and Carers3 Post-Mortem PracticesConclusion1 Informality2 Social CapitalBibliographyIndex