Small Hands of Sorrow

Shawad Dara
July 16, 2003
English 1301
The Small Hands of Sorrow
“Child labor is the result of a complex set of factors; poverty; lack of schools; poor health care; war; and many others. Too often, photographs of child laborers do not describe these complexities; solutions must meet the needs of individual children. We need to know who they are to know what they need.” That was part of the mission statement stated by the Child Labor and Global Village Foundation. The Child Labor and Global Village Foundation is a team of eleven photographers who photograph eleven child workers around the globe. Child labor is a major issue for America and other countries. Closer analysis can uncover what child labor is, who the child laborers are and what they do, and what one can do to aid these children in despair.
Child labor is work children do that harms them whether physically, mentally, morally, or by blocking their access to education. Child labor is mostly identified as when a child is working and he/she has not yet reached the age of 18 years of age, while others say that child who is working before the age of 14-15 is a child laborer. The worst form of child labor include all forms of child slavery such as trafficking of children, debt bondage and serfdom and forced compulsory labor, also including forced compulsory recruitment of children into army for use as ground soldiers, children sold for prostitution and production of pornography, and use of children in illegal activities such as selling drugs. The only thing that makes child labor

objectionable is if it is exploitative. To exploit has really three different meanings but in this case it means to make use of selfishly or unethically. An example of exploitation
would be when...