The Continuum Concept: A Book Review
Wow. Can I say wow?
The Continuum Concept, by Jean Liedloff, is in my opinion, largely a social commentary. The writer spent a great deal of time living with and observing Native South Americans in their tribal communities and contrasts their methods of child-raising to our very different North American methods.
Basically, Liedloff postulates that these tribal humans live much closer to the natural human state (the ‘continuum’) than we “civilized” humans - a postulation with which I’m sure none of us would disagree. However, she also asserts that as such, their children (and adults!) are happier, more well adjusted, and enjoy a higher quality of life than do their Western counterparts. She stresses that we have come to rely so much on our intellect and so little on our inborn instincts that we miss out on much of the truly human experience.
Her basic idea is that babies should enjoy an in-arms stage until they, of their own volition, begin to move away from mother - in other words, holding and wearing your baby close to you until they begin crawling away. Then, as baby becomes more independent and wants to explore more, he will spend less time in arms and more time exploring and learning about his environment. She gives a phenomenal description of life as a baby whose continuum has not been disrupted vs. a Western baby - a description that literally brought me almost to tears. Another striking idea was that humans are very much social beings and that our culture has vilified babies and children - books talk about your baby ‘manipulating’ you with their cries and the idea that you will spoil them if you hold them too much or respond to their cues. Liedloff has observed that children are supremely social and, given the right conditions for development, need very little discipline. Ultimately, a social being learns quite quickly to behave in the manner in which he has the most positive reaction with his peers - in essence, he learns by trial and error and by observation of reactions which behaviours are desirable and which are undesirable.
She also discusses co-sleeping, trusting in your baby - not only for their cues in communicating their needs, but also to be competent to keep themselves safe and busy with minimal adult intervention - as well as education, work, and discipline. I think one of my greatest revelations in reading this book was about becoming UN-child-centered. Hearing someone say that my child is looking to me to lead and be an adult and that she is trying to learn from my interactions and the daily work I do has freed me to feel okay about doing housework with Gwen.
Although written from an evolutionary standpoint, I can easily appreciate the times where she talked about human evolution leading our infants to expect a certain type of treatment after their birth - breastfeeding, co-sleeping, being held or worn, enjoying a close attachment to mother, and then being able to expand his view of the world to other human relationships and other environments. Even without believing in macroevolution, I think we can all agree on microevolution and that the last few hundred years of human history differ greatly from the previous thousands in the ways that babies are treated - after all, if you live in a place where there are predators, you’re not likely to put your baby to sleep in another room and let them cry to get the attention of said predator, are you? 
If you’re interested in reading more about the concept, check out these articles. It’s a bit of a fringe book and one that I’d only heard of once before coming across it on a number of websites I was checking out. Honestly, though? I would NOT hesititate to recommend this book to anyone. I think it’s completely changed my view of children and my relation to them - especially my own. I think everyone who has an interest in children and society should read this!
