DOI: 10.4324/9780203885208-12
We are bringing together years and years of personal, professional, and academic experience with issues connected to multicultural children’s literature and literacies teaching. Over the years, we have grappled with theories and practices that are aligned with socially just teaching and research. This book brings together two lived experiences in dialogue with many texts. From the first pages of this book, we invited you, the reader, to critically read our work. Because we are committed to contributing to the dialogue on the critical teaching of children’s literature, we wanted to initiate a conversation with colleagues who have been engaged with these issues for many years. Mingshui Cai, Patrick Shannon, and Junko Yokota graciously accepted our invitation to participate in an e-mail dialogue over a period of two weeks, in response to Chapters 4 and 5, and to our proposal of critical multicultural analysis of children’s literature. We posted our responses and reacted to each other’s contributions. What follows is a negotiated version of our dialogue.
Fourteen years ago in “I Am the Canon” (Shannon, 1994), I attempted to articulate what Maria José and Masha define as a critical multicultural lens for children’s literature. My prose was clumsy, but my intent was sincere—to discuss multiple discourses and issues of power. In my work with preservice and inservice teachers, I chose to discuss the social construction of conditions of normality in which the Other is identified. My hopes were that these teachers would see themselves as implicated in the labels of “normal” and “other” on many dimensions and recognize that the use of these labels was more a statement of power than of biological, historical or moral fact. Together, we worked (and still work) to expose privilege in its many forms, to name our shifting roles in forms of oppression, and to fight the canon (in all the texts that surround us). I hope Maria José and Masha would agree that such work could be a form of multicultural analysis.
In the United States, times are hard. The ninth ward in New Orleans is still razed—three years after Katrina. The U.S. PATRIOT Act leaves the U.S. Constitution in tatters with habeas corpus and privacy rights eviscerated. Torture is condoned. The federal government has sub-contracted for a wall to be built along the Mexican border. The occupation of Iraq is in its sixth year. The Supreme Court uses technicalities to prevent women from suing for equal pay and threaten women’s right to choose. Millions of families have had their mortgages foreclosed.
Often, hard times draw hard lines between and among groups. Currently, few seem willing or able to step over these lines in order to use a critical multicultural lens to perform multicultural analysis on any texts. Perhaps it’s fear or greed that keeps many from acknowledging the human connections among us all. In John Edgar Wideman’s words, “We’s all one person, all the same body” despite all apparent difference. Yet, we act as if neglect, surveillance, torture, exclusion, occupation, discrimination, and exploitation “by design would never happen to their [our] people.” But they do happen. We are diminished as human beings regardless of whether we suffer, inflict, or stand by silently in the face of particular circumstances of hard times. We will be complicit unless we act in order to reconcile theories of recognition with theories of redistribution.
Maria José and Masha recommend critical multicultural analysis as such an act in these hard times. They present classroom practices that bring recognition of differences within investigations of power during literature studies, theorizing their work with post-structural and critical discourses. Since 1994, however, the teaching of reading has fallen on hard times as well. Government policies and reports tout the discourse of science as the answer to all questions about literacy and text, positioning all other discourses as useless at best, and harmful at worst. Science is the modern enforcer of normality as well—Hernstein and Murray’s Bell Curve is also called the “normal curve”. To get to critical multicultural analysis, we must address the power of science in the teaching of reading.
I agree that critical multicultural analysis of any literature, including multicultural literature, challenges dominant ideologies and discourses which are held as the “norm.” This approach should be used in the classroom practice of teaching literature, especially what is considered the canon, the “norm” of literature, so to speak. Daniel Hade (1997) argued along the same line when he proposed that we “read multiculturally,” that is, adopt a critical stance toward a text and read the signs of race, class, gender in it. My question is: If we can read any text multiculturally or do a critical multicultural analysis of it, do we still need a literary category called multicultural literature? The concept of multicultural literature seems to have been expanded and diluted to the point that it has lost its meaning. Let’s put it to rest for the moment and use the term “multiethnic literature” instead. Do we still need a category of multiethnic literature? Historically, multiethnic literature has claimed a space in children’s literature for the marginalized ethnic groups, especially people of color. It has been a vehicle to fight the hegemony of the dominant culture in the publication of children’s literature. It embodies the dream of equity for oppressed groups. Once it came into being, however, some writers from the mainstream culture took it over and wittingly or unwittingly, smuggled their dominant discourses into it. The drawn-out insider vs. outsider debate is in essence a power struggle over the control of this niche in children’s literature.
This is a battle between the dominant and dominated groups. Yes, power is a complex matrix. Many forces are playing against each other even within the same cultural group. When reflected in literature, race, class, gender, and other social political issues may play out in the same text. However, distinguishing between dominant and dominated groups does not necessarily render power relations to dualisms or mask power relations, just as distinguishing between “dominant ideologies” and “dominated ideologies,” “dominant discourses” and “dominated discourses” does not lead to dualism or the cover up of complicated power relations. Within a text we may find binary oppositions between white and black, male and female, upper class and lower class. One group holds power over the other. For example, in Esperanza Rising, white people discriminate against Mexican immigrants, Mexican males (e.g., Esperanza’s uncles) control the fate of females (e.g., Esperanza and her mother), upper class (e.g., Esperanza and her father) holds a superior position over lower class (e.g., Miguel). The issues of race, class, and gender are interlocked into a complex matrix of power relations. When we classify this book as multiethnic literature that represents the dominated racial group, we highlight the power relation between oppressing and oppressed racial groups. Anyone who reads the book will see the main conflict in the story is racial conflict. To focus on the conflict between dominant and dominated racial groups in this book, however, does not mean we will certainly ignore intra group power relations and reduce the text to racial essentialism. We just foreground the power struggle between racial groups to address an important issue in a racialized society.
Another concern with the use of “multiethnic literature” is that the term is divisive, signifying “that White is the normative term against which all other groups are defined as ‘Other.’” For the oppressed groups to be recognized as “Other” is better than oblivion. Historically, oppressed groups’ cultures were not recognized and almost wiped out. The stories by and through which they live (Gates, Jr.) were not heard. They have been marginalized and alienated, forced to accept the norm and assimilate into the mainstream culture. The emerging of multiethnic literature as “Other” is actually a challenge to the norm. By comparing and contrasting this literature about the Other and the literature of the dominant culture, readers may learn how ideological hegemony is challenged in the former while maintained in the latter. The term “multiethnic literature” seems divisive. But multiethnic literature does not create borders that separate; it only reveals borders that have already existed. To expose the divide is the first step to fight for recognition, understanding, acceptance, and eventually canonical status. Multiethnic literature does not just provide information about the Other (by the way, the discourse of Otherness does not necessarily imply that its cultural identity is fixed and unified; if it did, the discourse of dominant culture would also imply its identity is fixed and unified) but more importantly it also exposes “White privilege” and institutionalized racial oppression. It fosters not only “children’s cultural imagination” but also “a historical and sociopolitical imagination.” To interrogate literature of the dominant culture is one way to challenge its ideological hegemony; to read multiethnic literature like Esperanza Rising is another. The critical multicultural approach should not exclude multiethnic literature.
Again, do we need the literary category of multiethnic literature? If it is eliminated, will there be more or less books about ethnic minorities, or parallel cultures as Virginia Hamilton put it? Will the power relation in the world of children’s literature be more balanced or lopsided?
I think that the key question is the one Mingshui raised: do we need the term, multicultural children’s literature (or multi-ethnic children’s literature)? I think we need the practice of critical multicultural analysis, partly because I think it does not require bending the language (many cultures in one book? restricted to people of color? owning a particular ideology?) but mostly because I think it’s important to teach children and ourselves to look at what we read constantly with a critical eye, looking at how the text handles culture in general and specifically. I like what Rudine [Sims Bishop] has been doing with her writing: focusing specifically on literature by and about African Americans and not labeling it “multicultural.” There is no ambiguity about the population, and I think that it fosters good conversation about authenticity and scholarship.
If we eliminate multicultural literature and multiethnic literature, should we also eliminate multicultural education and multicultural analysis? And replace them with, say, democratic or diversity education and specific critical approach to literary analysis such as post-structuralist, postcolonial, neo- Marxist, or feminist?
I think that Sonia Nieto makes a good case for preserving “multicultural education” but she recognizes that perhaps in the future, we will all be talking about critical anti-bias education and we will assume and indeed practice it without the necessity for a label. So far all of the other labels are narrow and open to even more challenges and “yah-but’s.”
What does “multicultural” really mean in all those terms? To me, terms with the epithet “multicultural” were generated to decentralize the dominant culture. Once the binary opposition of dominant culture and dominated cultures are eliminated, all those terms cease to be meaningful. But when will that be? Multiculturalism is not only about diversity but also about equality and equity. In either the implementation of multicultural education or the reading of multicultural literature, we may focus on diversity only and do not talk about power structures and struggles. The problem lies in our practice, not in the labels.
When Masha and I first began developing our lens of critical multicultural analysis we stepped away from the pedagogical/literary category of multicultural children’s literature, because it was getting in the way of us problematizing multicultural children’s literature and the teaching of children’s literature in general, as well as considering the complexities of power. But as we moved away from this category, it felt dangerous. The diversity of histories and cultures in our midst became obscured. We found ourselves gravitating back to the issues that multicultural children’s literature represents. As you know, we argue that the history of underrepresentation in the United States needs to be at the center of this work; otherwise, critical multicultural analysis is not truly grounded within U.S. history and present sociopolitical circumstances. We agree with Stuart Hall that it is through representation that we negotiate our identities. We argue that it is through critical multicultural analysis of cultural representations that we negotiate spaces for resistance of dominant worldviews and taking action in the world.
The children’s literature that finally brought me to this work was when I took stock of what was happening to Francisco Jiménez’s work. His children’s books were being recognized by regional and national awards. Folks were deeming them as pure representations of the Mexican American culture. As I read them, I found these practices of recognition to be problematic. He was bringing us up close to the classism and racism that Mexican American migrant farmworkers live on a daily basis. I don’t deny that his work is an important contribution to the field of children’s literature, and to Mexican American children’s literature because he places this community on the landscape. But that’s not all that Francisco is doing. He also is exposing intrafamily, intragroup, and intergroup exercise of power, complexities that were getting diluted by the prevailing definition of culture that anchors multicultural children’s lilterature. Culture and power are inseparable.
Many children are underrepresented. White privilege oftentimes is conflated with class. White children (this is a gross lumping of people, just like all the other cultural labels are) who are poor also experience discrimination because they don’t possess the cultural capital of the middle and upper classes. Race cannot be addressed in isolation from class. We were careful to consult with scholars of color, since we are two White women of workingclass background. They argue for the examination of class and gender alongside race, showing the complex dimensions of power.
As I read Patrick’s contribution, especially the third paragraph, I was reminded of Nelson Mandela’s words that he shared with a crowd of thousands and thousands of people in Boston, Massachusetts during the mid-1980s. He reminded us: “If South Africa is not free, you are not free.” Those words rang through my being as he uttered them. You see, I’ve been trying to understand power all my life. As a peasant child in the Azores, I saw how my father, even though he was an elder (someone highly regarded in our village), was discriminated by the aristocracy that resided in the cities north and south of us. Within my own family, trying to understand my older siblings’ frustration with our family’s economic situation, which was a disconnect with their middle-class college experiences. Within my own cultural community, interactions between my family and priests, supervisors, teachers, affluent people, and the list continues. This book springs out of my lived experience as a Portuguese American of peasant, working- and middle-class background. I see and hear the world differently.
As we became aware of the cultural construction of children’s literature, we had the enormous task of naming the particular reading lenses that were unfolding before us. We knew that the word “critical” had to be part of the name. Critical, for us, signifies that an imbalance of power exists in the United States as well as the role that language can play in its maintainence. We decided to use “multicultural,” even though it has been co-opted and misunderstood, because it signifies the multiple histories among us. We try to address the science of reading in Chapter 2 where we historicize literacy (Western) and school literacies. We have read across many texts and located several themes related to literacy practices that we examine. We connect these themes to sociopolitical factors: These themes are not endemic to the children, families and/or communities represented. The texts help us to show how social institutions like schools are implicated in these themes. For example, we invite the reader to rethink the label of “struggling reader” and invite how critical literacies practices are rarely reflected in texts for children. A lot of the books represent code breaking and text using practices. Rare moments exist among characters using their prior knowledge to make sense of texts and literacies as social tools for social change. Why aren’t these practices represented in children’s literature?
Patrick’s recommendation to reconcile theories of recognition with theories of redistribution is important. I’m wondering if one can exist without the other. Can these theories reside side by side? Is redistribution enough? Certainly recognition alone is not enough. What are we redistributing? In what ways does redistribution create spaces for us to negotiate our identities? Reconstruct power? I agree with Masha: Perhaps the direction we might want to go in is speaking to the specificity of particular cultural experiences, much like the work of Rudine Sims Bishop on African Americans, Sonia Nieto on Puerto Ricans, and Debbie Reese on Native Americans. The cautionary word for culturally specific work is not to isolate the cultural experience from the power structure in which it resides, but to re/contextualize it in its history(ies) and the broader sociopolitical context, keeping in mind that the book’s construction and the social processes among the characters are not immune to these social factors.
Going back to Mingshui’s questions, what should we do? Do we eliminate multiethnic children’s literature and multicultural education? What comes to mind is what the social scientist Immanuel Wallerstein (core-periphery studies) once said: If we lived in a socially just world, the social sciences would fail to exist. (This statement is instructive when we consider the role of multicultural children’s literature in schools and communities.) I wonder if that would be the case. I also wonder if the teaching and research practices of the social sciences help reproduce, maintain, and perpetuate social inequities. Nevertheless, we need the social sciences, that is, we need to consider the texts that we use. I agree with Mingshui: We need to examine our practice which includes considering what we read, as well as how we read and what we do with what we read.
I got a question about the definition of “critical multicultural analysis.” How do you define “multicultural” in the term? How is the term different from, say, “social political criticism”? Maybe you have already defined it somewhere in your book but I missed it.
Because words get meaning from the words around them, “multicultural” signals to us the diversity of histories and cultural experiences among us, keeping our definition of culture in mind. “Critical” reminds us that there’s an imbalance of power. When I first designed the heuristics [see Appendices C and D] to represent the power continuum and critical multicultural analysis, I was careful to ground both processes within the power relations of race, class, and gender. The spiral on the continuum and the swirl on the critical multicultural analysis diagram signify the dynamism, fluidity, and recursivity of these processes. These dynamic representations demonstrate the role of reflexivity (thinking about thinking and practice) in this work. These words are imperfect. They are ones that we have at hand at the present time.
I’d like to make a few final comments: First, I still believe that to decenterize the dominant culture in the four phases of Stuart Hall’s model of communication: production, circulation, consumption, and reproduction of message, in our case, literature, the term multicultural literature serves as a slogan that sends out a clearer and more powerful message than such specialized terms as African American literature, Mexican American literature, and Chinese American literature.
Second, culture is not fixed; it is constantly changing. Culture is not monolithic; it is complex. Cultures do not have clearly defined borders: they permeate each other. While we emphasize the intracultural fluidity and complexity and intercultural influence, however, we should not deny the existence of culture as an entity, which in Nieto’s words, is bound by “a combination of factors that include a common history, geographic location, language, social class, and religion.” Some cultures are more unified, stable, and have more clearly defined boundaries than others. For example, Amish culture is more so than, say, Jewish culture. The more factors a group of people share, the more closely bound they are. “European American” is a very loosely bound group. So are males or females. However, when we analyze the gender power relations, we have to treat males and females as separate cultural groups. The labels of “the grossly lumped” groups may give a false impression of intracultural unity and we should be aware of their limitations, but they are indispensable for analyzing intercultural power relations.
Third, I agree that race cannot be addressed in isolation from class or gender, but I have a different understanding of how white privilege is conflated with class. Yes, poor white people experience discrimination because they do not possess the cultural capital of the middle and upper classes. But that discrimination is class discrimination, not racial discrimination. Historically, white people, rich or poor, possessed privilege over and discriminate against black people and other ethnic minorities, rich or poor. That is white (racial) privilege and racial discrimination. Again, take Esperanza Rising, for example. The poor Okies were discriminated against but they still have “white privilege” over Mexicans. Rich white people may enjoy more white privilege than poor white people. A rich plantation owner, for example, could have many black slaves while a poor white farmer might not be able to own one even if he was granted the right to slave ownership. Although poor white people have racial privilege, they experience the same class oppression and discrimination as poor black people. This common ground may unite them in a joint fight against the ruling classes. Racial issues are, in the final analysis, class issues. Racist ideologies and discourses are created by white ruling classes to serve their own interests.
I appreciate this opportunity to share my thoughts on multicultural issues in children’s literature and benefit from the insights of other participants in this dialogue.
I own two sweatshirts. One from the University of Wisconsin, a university our daughter attends, and one from Penn State, where our son studies. Both are grey with the university name stitched across the front in school colors. It’s cold here, and I’ve worn both this week. I work at Penn State and students and faculty commented on my attire the day I wore my Wisconsin one. They read my shirt text as disloyal to our campus and cause, teasing me that I have gone to the dark side. “We are Penn State,” they cry when I wear the one with the blue lettering. If I explain that the shirt is a gift from our daughter who tries to trace the genetic evolution of corn in John Doebley’s lab, they smile at my proud reading of the Wisconsin text.
Last month 32 students were arrested during a sit-in after our Old Main administration building closed. The police took the students away in handcuffs. They were there to protest a reading of my Penn State sweatshirt that is different than the loyalty declaration my students and colleagues make. These protesters don’t read the Penn State text as a statement of solidarity with the Penn State mission. Rather, they read the text as hiding the social relations with which the sweatshirt is produced. They are not proud to wear Penn State college apparel because Penn State administrators have not signed the Designated Suppliers Program (DSP), which would ensure sweatshop free labor in the college apparel production process. They attach more meaning to my sweatshirt—We are Penn State, and We Support Sweatshop Labor.
These protesters and many behind them (our son is the branch president of Student Labor Action Project) are engaged in critical multicultural analysis and literacy lessons that bridge theories of recognition and redistribution. They read a multicultural, multiethnic, or transnational text that crosses many borders in its production, while attempting to demystify the power relations, in order to improve the literacy on campus and improve the jobs (lives?) of the workers who produce the college apparel text.
Race, ethnicity, gender, and class mix, perhaps inseparably, within these texts and readings. These (protester, student) literacy teachers believe that if they can help college students, faculty members, alumni, administrators, and the Board of Trustees to read Penn State apparel with a critical multicultural lens, then together these “new” readers can force the Penn State administrators to sign the DSP. They seek to establish connections between the real producers and customers (readers) and to provoke action on these new connections—this new knowledge. Every step of the way, these teachers confront power.
The science of the matter is not settled. Many economists consider sweatshops to be an essential step in the development of an economy, providing employment for the displaced agricultural worker (perhaps with the belief that none of their people will ever work in one).
The business of the matter is not settled. After Kathy Lee Gifford’s line of clothing was connected with sweatshop production in the 1990s, the college apparel industry (Nike, Adidas, etc.) formed a corporate sponsored group to monitor labor conditions. Penn State uses this corporate service.
The law enforcement is not settled. Although outlawed in the United States, sweatshops still run in many major cities on immigrant labor.
The emotions are not settled on the matter. The customers for Penn State apparel are proud of their association with the university, and despite the facts, are reluctant to believe that their university could be involved in unethical economic practices.
The politics of the matter are settled. The Board of Trustees and the University President must sign this agreement. While pressures can be applied, very few people control this situation on the Penn State campus. While other university boards and presidents have signed the DSP (Wisconsin, Cornell and 30 others), ours remain reluctant to read with a critical multicultural lens.
I indulge in this long metaphor in order to suggest that we have many allies working to help people engage in multicultural analyses of the texts in their lives. These allies assault readers’ comfort with the status quo, the barriers that keep others in discomfort, and literacy practices that support both. In a global economy, every text is multinational, multicultural, multiethnic and complicated by the nexus of power that surrounds it. We are all caught in this web, unless we realize our agency to identify, name, and act. How do we work together to recognize and redistribute? I think this book points us in a useful direction.
Reading the chapters of this book and Mingshui Cai’s and Patrick Shannon’s responses, I feel enriched by the deep thinking, eloquent expressions, and engaging challenges that were presented. It is a privilege to have this opportunity to explore “where I am” at this moment in my understanding of multicultural literature and think about it with others. Maria José and Masha recognized that my own operating definitions of multicultural literature changed from publications in 1993 to 2001. And over the 15 years that I have written and taught on this topic, I’m glad that I’ve learned and adapted my view of the world as I engage in critical discussions with others. But most of all, I realize that, for me, it’s the personally “lived experiences” that have deeply affected and challenged my own beliefs and have shaped the continuous development of my understandings.
In reading Maria José and Masha’s chapters, I was reminded of my own responses to various terms that have been used over time. I remember when the “people of color” became popular, and Mingshui and I worked together as colleagues at University of Northern Iowa. We looked at each other and asked, “How yellow do you feel today?” The recognition of color as the identifier of diversity felt strange. My perception of the concept of color was heightened when my daughter’s principal said to me, “I don’t know how many children of color attend my elementary school because I’m color blind.” I found this statement incredibly naїve, and responded, “I do. There are three. My daughter, her classmate, and his cousin.” But this was in the early 1990s, and there has been considerable progress in our understanding and recognition of such concepts since then. We’ve recognized the need for listening to the book creators and the researchers who offer “insider perspectives.” In the 1990s, I presented many talks and papers about the need for being more inclusive in the literature offered to our students. I focused on “cultural authenticity” as the criteria for selecting and evaluating the literature and I called for recognition and inclusion of multiple perspectives. Yet I knew that simply having multiple cultures represented did not solve the multicultural questions. I recognized that well-intentioned images of children around the world, wearing “native costumes” and happily holding hands were a huge problem in reinforcing stereotypes.
Once, after I presented a keynote talk at a conference, Jack Zipes commented that my points were interesting but “not enough.” He felt that if the goal was for true cultural understanding, merely adding culturally authentic books to the repertoire of what children read was not enough. I wrote a chapter on “Diverse Perspectives” in a textbook for college students. Co-author Charlie Temple said to me that I needed to be stronger in my advocacy for multicultural literature. At that time, I was only beginning to understand the role of power and politics as related to the reading of literature. Why was this? Perhaps it’s because, as one colleague said to me, “Even among those of us identified as ‘minority,’ it’s not all the same because you’re from a privileged minority so you get the benefit of doubt.” She was implying that I had not suffered from the oppression that others may have. On one job interview for a university faculty position, I was told by one committee member, “You’re from the wrong minority. In fact, it’s people like you who are taking up space we need for other minorities to be represented.” Was it that I hadn’t had the experience of being among the oppressed that allowed me to focus on “authentic portrayal” and “inclusiveness” in an idealistic way? I realize this is not true for many—and in fact, sometimes it’s people from outside an oppressed group who are able to be more analytically perceptive because of their deep study and committed beliefs about issues of equity. For me, it took specific incidences in the past few months for me to understand how it feels to have others impose their power on me in oppressive ways.
My participation in these two book award committees during the past year gave me much to be thankful for: being part of a group that carefully considered the important issues related to culture and portrayal as well as the implications of how these stories might be perceived by readers, based on how they were told. All books that were considered for these awards were either books relating to social justice or international books. Although many were excellent, others had problems that were recognized through perceptive discussion. I came to believe that targeting the lens through which we evaluate books is very important; when asked to consider books for different reasons, each lens requires a new way of considering the book. The most dangerous was the presentation of issues that addressed problems of our world yet resolved them through unrealistic or even condescending ways. It doesn’t help readers when the solution offered only leaves readers feeling hopeless that such solutions could occur. These kinds of books sometimes perpetuate the recognition that there are stories that need to be heard but seek ways of resolving issues through stereotypical means. In other words, such books fulfill what Maria José and Masha cite in Chapter 3, In 1976, the Council on Interracial Books for Children questioned the source of values imbedded in children’s books. They argued that they were not from an individual, but from society as a whole: “Children’s books generally reflect the needs of those who dominate that society … the prevailing values are supportive of the existing [power] structure.”
As the multicultural publishing increased throughout the 1990s, Marc Aronson questioned the need for a “separate set of ethnically-based awards” (i.e., Coretta Scott King and Pura Belpré Awards) since all such books qualify for general awards as well, and they had begun to get widespread recognition in high profile awards such as the Newbery and the Sibert. However, it’s not about multicultural books being qualified for major awards that are based on literary quality of which cultural depiction is not the major criteria or the lens through which we critique the book. My participation in the two committees (Jane Addams and Outstanding International Books) endorses my belief that having awards that clearly hold specific criteria is as important as general awards for quality literature. Although there are more authors and illustrators representing diverse voices, the publishing industry has not diversified as much. It may take another generation before the more diverse field of newer editors become established in the publishing field. In this era of corporate culture making decisions based on the bottom line of each book rather than balancing the publishing agenda based on editorial vision, this represents a big problem. The question today must go far beyond that of representation, but to that of gate-keeping. Who is reviewing, reading and buying? Who’s talking and who’s listening? Is it the scholars? Or is it also people who work directly with children? What about editors, publishers, reviewers and others who directly impact what is made available and accessible to young readers? Like policymakers that impact what is happening in education, the publishing industry directly impacts what is available to be read. Reviewers play an important role in featuring aspects of books that should be noted. They can gloss over cultural issues that they do not notice, or they can help make readers aware of cultural issues if they choose to write about them in their reviews. Frankly, I find it troubling that in 2007, two books that go against my beliefs about depicting cultural experiences caught my attention as books that received high levels of attention, earning starred reviews and spots on recommended booklists.
Tolerance – I’m currently living in Munich, spending five months doing research at the International Youth Library (IYL). I submitted my research proposal on the topic, “international books that provide fodder for understanding issues related to peace and social justice” but it ended up being translated into German and back into English as “Peace and Tolerance.” While this is a phrase I often hear used, “tolerance” has a negative tinge in nuance as opposed to adopting a more positive stance towards understanding and taking action to contribute to a more equitable world. Tolerance simply implies putting up with differences rather than understanding them.
Other – I’ve been reading research and engaged in discussions with people from around the world. I read such key concepts as “otherness,” “cultural alterity” and “post colonialism.” With the best intention while giving much attention to the plight of those who have not been represented in previous times, for me, the terminology gives off negative connotations of inferiority. Sometimes, it allows a reinforcement of the concept of “the poor others” who are to be pitied so their stories can be told; at worst, there cam be condescending attention.
Parallel Cultures – After reading Maria José and Masha’s book, there can be no doubt that power plays such an inevitable role that there can be no such thing as truly parallel cultures. This is another idealistic yet not realistically achievable concept.
The most powerful book I read last year is The Book Thief by Marcus Zusak. It takes place during the Holocaust, and the Jewish people are walked from Pasing train station (where I am now living), along the Würm River (the path I take to get to the International Youth Library every day), to Dachau Concentration Camp. Visiting Dachau on a cold, gray day of snow blowing around was a sobering experience. After the Venezuelan journalist who is also studying at the IYL spent four hours at Dachau, he noted that the Holocaust is not over—there is still Guantanamo. And that’s only one of the multitude of things going on in our world today that shows that merely reading about the past and giving voice to those experiences is not enough. As an educator, I feel the need to consider the ways in which those who work with children can scaffold children’s understanding and probing of these tough issues through the questions they ask, the responses they give, and the guidance they can provide.
I’ve just returned from attending my daughter’s graduation from Grinnell College. In my daughter’s graduation packet was a pledge card for graduates to sign, saying that they will consider the societal and environmental impact of career choices and employment decisions they make. I had the good fortune of riding to the airport with Judith Butler, commencement speaker and highly regarded feminist philosopher whose advocacy to become an activist has been inspirational to many, especially as Grinnell students responded to hate mail and crimes to call for a “hate-free” school. As a parent, I was glad to hear a “call for action” as the graduates step on into the world beyond their school.
I’m told that my views are “too pedagogical” by those who are outside the field of education. There are those who believe that any way in which we as adults try to influence the thinking of children takes away from their ability to think for themselves or to recognize their ability to do so. Yet I believe we have responsibilities; I hold on to the hope that by going beyond that of making quality multicultural literature available, we can and will provide opportunities for fostering the kind of thinking and discussion that will likely lead to eventual action … that which makes a real difference in our world.