‘Good Babies’ or ‘Goodness of Fit?’ Normalizing and Pluralizing Dimensions of Contemporary Temperament Discourse

This paper explores contemporary discourse on temperamental differences in children in terms of how it embodies a central tension in modern liberal democratic society. This is the tension between normalization (the delineation of forms of behavior and experience that are deemed undesirable, in order to bring normative ideals of personhood into sharper focus), on the one hand, and a commitment to pluralism and the inclusion of diverse modes of experience and being on the other. Through examination of recent texts written for parents and professionals, it is argued that while contemporary North American temperament writings and practices evince normalizing elements, they also contain genuinely ironic and contextualizing features which challenge or attenuate the trend towards an increasing pathologization of various species of personality and behavioral ‘difference’.