A Child's Right to Play: The Social Construction of Civic Virtues in Toy Libraries

Abstract

In general, communities throughout the world hold that children have a fundamental right to play. Public policies and laws have long aimed to promote play by providing a range of financial and material resources. Toy libraries are an important resource that can provide children with vital developmental tools for play by allowing families to borrow toys in a process similar to public book libraries. An empirical study of a contemporary group of toy libraries explores how families use toy libraries to construct different social meanings. The toy library is an important way that parents can mediate their children's relationship with the marketplace. Moreover, different conceptualizations of citizenship are modeled within this institution based on the sharing of collective goods.