Book Reading #40: Coming of Age in Samoa

Chapter 14
Summary
The final chapter of the book mainly focuses on the education of the youth in America. Mead again brings up the point about how boys and girls have to make many decisions at a young age and face conflicting standards. Mead discusses how people are blinded by the American theory of endless possibilities and thus feel overwhelmed by the choices available to them even when there are not as many as they think there are. The author also brings up the family and how parents raise their daughters in ways that conflict with standards outside of the home.

Mead concludes by explaining how in a civilization where there are so many choices and so many ways of doing things, parents must teach their children how to think, not what to think.

Discussion
While reading this last chapter I had to keep in mind when this book was written. While I can draw parallels between some of the stuff she writes and while some of it does still apply even now, some of it was a little out dated (as to be expected from a book originally published in 1930). Still, she makes some good points. I especially liked how she said, “The children must be taught how to think, not what to think.” This is very important, and Mead put it very well in such few words.