Nancy Anderson is a professor in the
“Children’s literature consists of all books written for children, excluding works such as comic books, joke books, cartoon books, and non-fiction works that are not intended to be read from front to back, such as dictionaries or encyclopedias.”
“Literary elements should be found throughout all of children’s literature. These important elements include characters, point of view, setting, plot, theme, style, and tone.”
“Every teacher should have at least 300 books in their classroom library.”
Do you agree with her?
12 comments:
Hi, it's very interesting the article. With reference to the literary elements, the author highlights that the point of view of the author must be included. In this sense, consider this fragment where Swift seems to reflect his personal point of view towards the beggars through the protagonist Gulliver. (page 101):
'One day the governess ordered our coachman to stop at several shops, where the beggars (...) gave me the most horrible spectacles that ever an English eye beheld(...) But the most hateful sight of all was the lice crawling on their clothes.'
I know that Gulliver's has been a classic recommended for children throughout centuries. However, after reading this comment on the beggars, which probably reflects Swift's own point of view on such social class,I wonder myself up to what a degree is this book suitable for children, since class distinction is higly emphazised. In this case, Swift seems as if he were transmitting the reader his own point of view: that the beggars and pennyless are something negative or disgusting. I think that teachers must apply sometimes their critical thinking to judge whether a bibliography is recommended or not, specially when working with children in class.
But bear in mind that there are dozens of dissimilar versions. I don't think anyone would read the original rendering of Gulliver's Travels to children. An adaptation may be suitable enough, though. Nonetheless, I reckon that even adaptations should be filtrated...
Hello MJ, that's the point.I'm totally agree with you. That's why I said that teachers should apply their critical thinking when selecting a bibliogaphy for children. Thanks' God, there are plenty of versions available nowadays. Nevertheless,I don't think this happened 200 years ago, when writters and publishers were progresively acknowledging that children needed a specific care( Blake, 1794). Probably, teachers could not be so selective with books during those times for Swift's own negative point of view towards the beggars in especial, was filled in children's mind as if his own exclusive, classist and reduccionist view had been the natural way of conceiving those sectors of the Brobdingnag society, and desgracefully the normal tendency to refer to the beggars. Luckily, as you mentioned, there are actually versions available to protect children from such pessimistic points of view. Bye, Nestor.
I think the discussion so far is moving towards the concept of Bowdlerism, a concept that we analysed in depth last year, although we weren’t able to consider it this year. If you’re interested in this, you can check Thomas Bowdler’s biography here, and read more specifically on Bowdlerism in Gulliver’s Travels here.
I didn't know about Bowdlerism. According to his biography, Boudler, being a child, noticed that his father when read him Shakespeare,left aside or unread some parts that he considered not appropiate for the mind of a child. Later in his adult life, Boudler was interesting in revising books that attracted children, to see if there were extracts that should be censored to them. Comming back to Vanesa's article, which is very interesting, and specifically to the question 'if one is agree with Nancy Anderson?' I would say I am partially agree with her since she omitted to mention such an important concept like Boudlerism, refered by Simud, which includes those versions for children that leave aside those passages considered to be not suitable for them and revise the point of view of the author.
I agree with Nancy Anderson that all books written for children are children’s literature. But, we as adults are who select those books. So, we have to be critical in our selection.
According to 18th c. literature, we commented in L&C III that 18th century is connected with the invention of childhood. In those times, there wasn’t any children’s literature and most of literature that children read weren’t invented for them. A good example of it are Gulliver's Travel and Robinson Crusoe. Fortunately,nowadays,there is a lot of books which are really written for children.
I firmily believe that children´s literature should be design to gain a new insight, such as a moral lesson, together with the idea of "getting fun". So, I strongly agree with Nancy Anderson, especially with the idea that comic books or joke books should not be suitable for children.
We all believe, Yani, that children's literature should be design to teach a child a moral and at the same time to get fun. In this sense, Gulliver's Travel is a literature for children, but if you read careful the comments you will be able to notice the negative point of view of Swift towards the beggars. This is just one negative sign, there are others like the way he describes human bodies and his constant comparisons between humans and animals. All this including 'Boulderism'is not commenting by Nancy Anderson, that's why I can not be 100 % agree with her. Bye, Nestor.
I agree with you nestor.Children´s literature should be designed to teach children life´s morals and also to entertain them,but in an easy way. Although,Gulliver´S Travel and Robinson Crusoe were taken as part of children´s literature,I can not be sure that many concepts and morals from this book can be easily understood by a child...
"Literaure´s children consits of all books written for childrem". In my opinion, this is true. You may think that a child who is reading a comic book will only enjoy it and won´t learn something from it. However, according to what I have read, many of these books teach children some moral lessons and valious such as tolerance and acceptance.
Paola
Hi,in Grammar II, we've been given the task of writing a fun-fiction for children which includes a case of homosexual and racial discrimination. So, one group's written a plot where two homosexual cookies are trying to get married and are looking for Shrek to marry them. As we all know, homosexual marriage is accepted in some countries nowadays. In fact, Roberto Piazza has recently got married with a man, his boyfriend. However, as this story is intended for children, things necessarily change a little bit. On the one hand, one can think that this story is suitable to develop in children the moral of non discrimination, which in this sense is something obviously positive. On the other hand, one should also consider the religious view, more concerned with morals, which does not accept homosexualism. As a third position, there are other views like the psychological and psychoanalytical postures. In my case, I think that these issues in children's literature should be left aside until children are grown up. This position does not necessarily mean that one is disciminating, but postponing such controvertial a issue for the future, when Children then become more grown up to analyse certain features of our society, to then adopt a posture. One thing are the adults, another thing are the children, whose minds are yet developing and should be concerned in their sports, education, passtimes, hobbies and so on.
Hi everyone!I share the opinion of Nancy Anderson that every teacher must have such a great number of books in the classroom because it is the best way of promoting curiousity in our students. Although sometimes it is impossible to have a good variety of books within the class, we as teachers should try to foster the interest of reading in kids anyway.So what I don´t think is that it is very necessary to exclude those texts that are not pure literature. We can share the experience of teaching through comics important topics and learn that everything that call our students´ attention is really valid and necessary.VERONICA.
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