Welcome, my friends, to In This Otherwise Lovely Book!
In this blog I will attempt to share any wisdom I may have, or to which I have been happily adjacent, about social justice themes in the media, especially as it relates to parenting.
I will be tagging all of my entries by title of work as well as themes addressed, and by the ages of kids for whom the book/movie etc. discussed is appropriate. Please feel free to let me know any other search tools that would be helpful.
I welcome comments, contributions, and additions. Please note that I will firmly delete any comments that derail this conversation. If you need to debate whether this blog needs to exist, Chad, you can do that somewhere else. :)
Finally, this blog has been inspired and deeply influenced by the tireless and amazing work of Debbie Reese on her brilliant website, American Indians In Children's Literature. Honestly, if you only have time to follow one blog about Children's literature, follow hers; mine can only ever be a shadow in comparison.
I thank you, Ms. Reese, from the bottom of my heart for: your amazing creation; your endless hard work; your kind responses to my questions every time I reached out to you; and for the inspiration that you gave me that helped me dream of, and bring to fruition, this page of my own.
Thank you also to my children, who have endlessly put up with my meddling in their development and my obsession that they be able to see and critique problematic media; to my long-suffering partner, who has allowed me to criticize his favorite movies (#yourfaveisproblematic) at great personal cost :) ; to my dad, who is always happy to read what I write; and to my mom, who teaches me every day me to leave the world better, and more beautiful, than I found it.
- toreyanna
I look forward to what you do! Pushing back on deeply entrenched misrepresentations and bias is going to take a lot more people than those who are doing it, now. Every person that speaks up to a friend, a teacher, a colleague will help us get to a more socially just society. So--thank you for this blog!
ReplyDeleteI love this! I wish I had this for my kids when they were little but so glad there is one now for the kids and parents to come.
ReplyDeleteI’m so excited about this blog! Do you have any interest in doing Caddie Woodlawn next? I see it pictured here, and my BFF is currently reading her daughter Little House on the Prairie, which I would never ever recommend anyone do, but my BFF loved it as a girl and didn’t realize how racist it was until she started reading it aloud, and now her daughter is hooked, so GAAAH. Maybe in your post on Caddie Woodlawn, you’d be addressing issues that a parent reading Little House ought to know. Or maybe you’d simply stamp it: DO NOT READ!
ReplyDeleteHi, grovergirl! I'm sorry that I didn't see this comment until now. YES, I have Caddie Woodlawn in my list. It's so heartbreakingly problematic - I think it's going to be a Do Not Recommend but with the strong point that we DO need free-spirited and strong outdoorsy windblown girls like Caddie on our bookshelves. Just, without the white saviorism/racism/manifest destiny/aaaagh/etc. And don't get me started on another free-spirited strong girl with very racist problems: Pippi Longstocking...anyway, thanks so much for reading and commenting! Also, has your BFF heard of Debbie Reese's site, American Indians In Children's Literature? Here's the section on just one of the LH books: https://americanindiansinchildrensliterature.blogspot.com/search/label/Little%20House%20on%20the%20Prairie and here is a different source that suggests replacement books that are less problematic: https://library.nashville.org/blog/2019/08/tackling-racism-childrens-books-little-house-prairie. Good luck!
Deleteugh - that was my first attempt at posting a reply with links. How ugly! I'll see if I can fix that.
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