This unusual bronze figurine of a female runner was possibly made in or near Sparta, Greece, between 520-500 BCE. Ancient Sparta was the only Greek city-state that provided girls with public schooling including physical education. Girls were praised for their swiftness and likened to prized racehorses in choral songs (called partheneia) sung by girls' choruses in Sparta and elsewhere. Spartan "virgins" also participated in the Heraea, games held at Olympia every four years in honor of the goddess Hera. Winners received olive crowns, shared a cow they sacrificed to Hera, and were allowed to dedicate statues of themselves engraved with their names. The bronze rivet on her right foot suggests that this figurine was possibly attached to a vessel or utensil at one time.

In what ways does this girl's body reveal that she was athletic? What might her clothing tell us about notions of girlhood in Sparta? Female athletes wore a short off-the-shoulder tunic like the one donned by this runner. It more closely resembled the semi-nude bare-breasted style of the legendary Amazons than the ornate and heavily draped Korai "maidens" elsewhere in Greece. What might account for the varieties of girlhoods throughout the Greek world?

Credit: London, British Museum 208. Photo: Museum, Courtesy of Trustees.

The only such product endorsed by world famous mountaineer and humanitarian, Sir Edmund Hillary, Sanitarium's sugar-free wholegrain wheat biscuit, Weet-Bix, has long been the country's most preferred breakfast cereal. Since 1992, the company has actively sought to promote children's sport, holding Tryathlons (the spelling is deliberate) at 11 centers throughout the country. (See http://www.sanitarium.co.nz/). Taking this source as an example of targeting the child as consumer, students might explore a range of contemporary and historical advertisements in relation to food, clothing, toys, sports, and entertainment options. Examples from early 20th-century newspapers, http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz, tend to appeal to adults purchasing for children's needs or interests. In the later decades of the 20th century, however, the advertising is generally focused on youth as consumers, with younger children often "conditioned" by television jingles and images to make requests for goods and services (as in the case of fast food outlets). Ethical issues relating to advertising may also be discussed.

In the 19th and early 20th centuries, there were obvious links between essential life skills and sporting pursuits, such as horse riding, fishing, hunting, running, walking, and cycling. High levels of physical activity were also connected with routine domestic chores, especially scrubbing and clothes washing. Being overweight was not a common problem. Fast foods scarcely existed save for fish and chips, popularly purchased on Fridays. Most meals were prepared at home; few Maori or Pakeha families were without access to a productive vegetable garden, neighborhood poultry, and fruit trees. Fish, fresh or smoked, was commonly eaten; lamb and beef were cheap and readily available, given the country's economic dependence on outdoor livestock farming. Diets were strongly seasonal, relatively free of preservatives and additives and, until the 1960s, most New Zealand children grew up with some basic knowledge of cooking. Urbanization, smaller housing sections, more married women in the workforce, and the rapid expansion of fast food outlets in the later decades of the 20th century, all contributed to significant changes in diets, those of low-income earners especially.