A Tale of Two Villages

Chapter three opens with detailed the two villages that are compared in this book, Scanno Italy and Cedar Key Florida. The portraits cover demography, history, political structure, geography, natural surroundings, social customs and traditions, with a particular focus on the lives of children. Both communities serve populations hovering around 1,700; both are majority Caucasian; both have strong community identities and traditions; and both are located in remote natural environments, with Scanno tucked in a valley of the Apennine Mountains in the Abruzzo region of Central Italy and Cedar Key occupying a chain of islands on the sparsely settled Gulf Coast of Florida in the South of the United States. The village portraits are followed by explicit comparisons of similarities and differences that are most relevant to the ecology of childhood, including early childhood and education systems, access to free play spaces, living on the edge of natural disaster, children’s sense of history and place, economic trauma and resilience, and presence or absence of racial and ethnic tension. The chapter closes with an exercise in triangulation, using multiple sources and uncomfortable conversations to explore attitudes towards racial and ethnic diversity.