And this change, it is a great
pleasure to be able to say, is being made in many places. The public
schools are gradually beginning to teach mothercraft, under various
guises, in many cities and the School of Practical Arts, Columbia Univ.,
gives a course in the "Physical Care of the Infant." Public and private
institutions are beginning to recognize, what has long been ignored,
that parenthood is one of the functions of men and women, toward which
their education should be directed. Every such step will tend, we
believe, to increase the birth-rate among the superior classes of the
community; every such step is therefore, indirectly if not directly, a
gain for eugenics; for, as we have emphasized time and again, a change
in public opinion, to recognize parenthood as a beautiful and desirable
thing, is one of the first desiderata of the eugenics program.
The introduction of domestic science and its rapid spread are very
gratifying, yet there are serious shortcomings, as rather too vigorously
set forth by A. E. Hamilton:
"There are rows of little gas stoves over which prospective wives
conduct culinary chemical experiments. There are courses in biology,
something of physiology and hygiene, the art of interior decoration and
the science of washing clothes.
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