More generally each issue will take the form either of a special issue (10 articles at most, solicited on the basis for a call for papers on a specific subject and/or theme) or a diversified issue (10 non-solicited articles sent to the journal by the authors) and will invariably consist of two sections: a ‘Debates and Controversies’ section, where the authors will offer an in-depth study of subjects in the news or of concern to society dealing with childhood, whether they are related to the academic or the public sphere – in the first issue, for example, Élise Guillermet, an anthropologist working in Morocco, looks into the figure of the child martyr in the Arab revolutions. ‘This section will allow authors to go deeper into a question, an idea or a controversy and to open up a dialogue between the academic world and the wider community,’ whilst the second section, ‘Teaching and Learning the Anthropology of Childhood and Children,’ highlights the treasures of the anthropology of childhood the world over, be it through the diversity of the locations it is taught in, the diversity of its approaches, and looks to ultimately show  that the anthropology of childhood indeed has its place in the international academic and public arena.

This richness in publications is moreover illustrated by the body of articles which form the opening issue. The content of the articles is eloquent: here Jeannett Martin looks into the germanophone tradition of the anthropology of childhood; there Gladys Chicharro broaches the anthropology of childhood in China; Andrea Szulc and Clarice Cohn approach the fledgling South American tradition. Further on it is David F. Lancy who shows how the field developed in the United States. Two French Africanist anthropologists, Doris Bonnet and Suzanne Lallemand, talk to each other about the difficulties of getting the anthropology of childhood to emerge in France. ‘Through this inaugural issue we wanted to show that a whole series of research works already existed across the world, and that it was necessary to create a site which aims to bring them together and valorise them.’ To round off the issue, Régine Sirota offers, as a counterpoint, a sociological look at childhood, whereas Alma Gottlieb, taking a more self reflexive approach, offers a view drawn from her personal experience on the status of an anthropologist who works in the field with children when this status is doubled, or not as the case might be, with the status of mother. A non exhaustive bibliography, citing research work in the French language, closes this first issue.

The second issue – whose online posting date has yet to be determined – will for its part be driven by a single theme, its editor confides to us: that of the child and religion. A theme present within anthropology since its beginnings but ‘insufficiently worked upon at a time when religious questions, notably on the public and political stage, sometimes take on an excessive importance, if not very important,’ she continues. How do children become religious beings, how do they develop beliefs, religious practices on the margins of adult worlds? Elements of a response ‘in the next episode.’