On Diversity--or lack thereof--in Children's Books
Which is great. I agree. We DO need diverse books. Here's my issue: we're not pushing for diverse enough books. Or rather, we (as a culture/subculture) don't care about portraying a diverse point of view if it's not a culturally popular view.
I may be a white Christian--not very diverse by the popular standard. But trust me when I say that I couldn't find a single contemporary book about a girl like me growing up. I was a church-going Roman Catholic--and most of the books about faithful Christians had no bones about pigeon-holing (and totally misrepresenting) Catholics as image-worshiping infidels who hadn't accepted Jesus. I was homeschooled--and if you were lucky enough to find a homeschooler in a book, you could bet good money on the chance that the happy ending would involve them finally fitting in and experiencing the "real world" in a public school.
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| For those of you who've never encountered it in a book; what homeschooling looks like a lot of the time. Yes, that is The Odyssey. Even the baby wanted to listen. |
And I still do. Because here's what's happening: a few brave authors are willing to portray these diverse views which get less press. And we readers are unabashedly tearing them down.
Last year, Shannon Hale published a YA dystopian novel, Dangerous, in which the main character was 1) Latin American, 2) homeschooled, and 3) missing a hand. You'd think we'd be happy about the diversity. Instead, I read reviews which said more or less, "I just couldn't connect with the main character. Maybe if she was just Latina, or just handicapped, but both of those on top of being homeschooled was just too much for me to swallow."
(Edit: Obviously I was dead wrong about the awards, as evidenced by those gold stickers in the image. Happy to be wrong in this case! Though I still wish this remarkable book about faith and empathy had garnered even more praise.)
I suppose one answer is that we don't complain about it very much. So here I am, complaining.
We need diverse books, too.
(Lest you think I'm only complaining, I want to take this opportunity to thank the authors and publishers of the above books and those like them. The fact that I now can find a book about a homeschooler or Catholic if I look hard enough makes me very happy.)
Edit 1/15/16: After reading the conversation here, a friend of mine sent me the link to this article in School Library Journal, well worth the read if this topic is of interest to you: Serving Conservative Teens
(Note: I'm an Amazon affiliate, so if you click on the images and make a purchase from Amazon I get a small percentage of the sale.)
Great post. I will be purchasing all those books. :) I am teaching a course on Catholicism and Literature this summer to a group of Catholic school teachers, so maybe they won't like the homeschooled characters either. ;) I think our society was interested in teaching children true *empathy*--which good books are quite capable of doing, with their role in forming the moral imagination--then we wouldn't have to focus so dang much on a fake sort of "diversity."
ReplyDeleteYes! I think empathy should be the primary point of fiction. By following another character. we're forced to put ourselves into their shoes. Reading books ONLY about people like me would be so boring and limiting.
DeleteWhat a great class!
I had a discussion about this with Steve Mooser when he was in the Carolinas. Let's just say there's a lot that's missing when it comes to diverse books. Now it seems that the agenda is driven by something else other than true diversity. And forget about religious diversity.
ReplyDeleteYou'd like The Staircase by Ann Rinaldi. Historical fiction. Yes, the Catholic school girls are portrayed esp. badly but there are sweet nuns and a Bishop who is kind and gentle (historically true). It's based upon the story of the miracle at the Chapel of Loretto in Santa Fe, NM.
Yes, there's a lot missing. Even if we just look at the race side of things, certain races (like your own) are under-represented--more than that, there's no support in the publishing world for these kind of books. All the awards and press goes to certain popular groups.
DeleteThanks for the recommendation! Ann Rinaldi is a fantastic writer and researcher. :)
Ummm, I forgot to say how great it is you got all the kids together for Odyssey. Even the baby is attentive!!! <3
ReplyDeleteFascinating post. I had never stopped to think about diversity as you mentioned - homeschooled characters, Catholic characters, etc. I think most people who push for more diverse books are focusing on race, gender, etc. - but that is just the tip of the iceberg. It also makes me think how I can approach my own writing.
ReplyDeleteI honestly think the best way to approach it in your writing IS to write what you know, as they say. BUT I think we should all be broadening our horizons in life so we know more of what's out there!
DeleteI agree that there's a certain amount of hypocrisy in the "diverse" movement, in that some religious groups are widely represented in "secular" fiction--Jewish ones, for example, while Christianity rarely is. Christian characters, I've been told, belong in the CBA market only. But Catholics aren't welcome in CBA nor are any specific mentions of denominations except maybe Amish. It's as if nondenominational evangelical were the only kind of Christian one is allowed to be. One wonders if Jan Karon's Mitford books would be publishable in today's climate.
ReplyDeleteThat so many traditional publishers are part of big media conglomerates is likely one reason that "diverse" means whatever flavor of the month appears to appeal to the masses most at the moment, not necessarily which groups are rarely acknowledged in books.
Yup. I know this is why many excellent writers choose self-publishing. The audiences really are there, but traditional publishing isn't reaching out to them unless they fit the "flavor of the month."
DeleteStill, Laura Amy Schlitz gives us hope. :)
You bring up a valid and important point, Faith. I'm not Catholic but I'm married to a devout Catholic and we raised our sons as Catholics. When they were in parochial school (they're now in their 20s), it was nearly impossible for me to find books about kids in parochial school! The only title I can recall buying for them was Good Grief, Third Grade by Colleen McKenna. They both loved it. But all of their other reading (besides school texts and lives of the saints) was about non-Catholic kids. Which is fine, because they grew up learning about other religions, other races, other cultures, as they should.
ReplyDeleteBut what bothered us was when a book treated Catholics as the "bad" characters or the ones you're supposed to avoid. I can still remember reading aloud to my sons a time travel novel in which a brother and sister went back in time to early colonial America (written, I believe by a "Christian" writer), and had to try to blend in . The characters said something about staying away from the Catholics, because they certainly could NEVER pretend to be that! As if Catholics were the worst thing you could be. Honestly. Diversity is important and I'm glad it's part of the conversation now, but diversity is about so much more than race or gender identity.
It makes me so happy to hear how you felt about that book you read with your sons, Joanne. You're right. Catholics are FREQUENTLY vilified. We've almost been forced to get used to it, but it's good to know that there are non-Catholics who still have a radar for that kind of thing. Anti-Semitism was finally brought to light in the years after WWII, but anti-Catholicism is somehow still acceptable. Yes, Catholics are people, and so there are plenty of bad Catholics in the world. But there are lots of nice ones, too! :)
Delete(By the way, The Hired Girl handles the issue of anti-Semitism wonderfully.)
I admit I only developed that "radar" after marrying a Catholic and raising Catholic sons (although I did have two good friends in my neighborhood when I was growing up who were Catholic, and my own upbringing by two non-religious parents was still open-minded). But once I developed it, I grew incensed by all the Catholic-bashing I saw in the media. I think Pope Francis has brought hope to a lot of my Catholic friends. Hope that someday, we'll all get along.
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