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Indivisible10: Conversations in Social Justice (with images, tweets) · etiberland

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Fall 2017 Institute: Conversations in Social Justice. Literature for Children and Adolescents (Center for Teaching through Children's Books)

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Since 2011, I've been tracking the number of young adult books about LGBTQ characters. Here are my statistics from 2011, 2012, 2013, and 2014, as well as an overview of LGBT YA published by mainstream publishers from 2003-13. I took a break in 2015 and 2016, but this year I've decided to update my statistics to include the last two years. I have not calculated the numbers for 2017, since the year is not over yet.

Anyone who reads these posts can see that the topics I've been interested in unpacking have changed and focused, my methodology has been refined, and the language I've used to describe gender has changed as I've learned more and as the language itself has evolved. Before I begin, let me provide some context and background.

Terms and Sources

This year (2017) I've decided to update the acronym I use from LGBT to LGBTQ, reflecting its current usage in the NLGJA Stylebook. LGBTQ stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer.

I'm counting YA books with LGBTQ main characters, and by that I mean the following:

A young adult book with an LGBTQ main character, or YA book that has a plot primarily concerned with LGBTQ issues.

Some books have multiple main characters, and if one of that cast of primary characters is LGBTQ, I count that book as an LGBTQ YA book (e.g., The Midnight Star by Marie Lu).

In the cases of books about LGBTQ issues, those issues typically focus around a straight person's relationship with an LGBTQ person who comes out to them (e.g., Skyscraping by Cordelia Jenson).

I do not include YA books with supporting LGBTQ characters (e.g., Conviction by Kelly Loy Gilbert) because I'm focused on books where the LGBTQ person is the star of the story, but I recognize that the dividing line between supporting and main can be pretty blurry.

I do not include YA books that have subtextual gay story lines (e.g., Underneath Everything by Marcy Beller Paul) because I'm focused on books where the gay story line is overt. In other words, I'm tracking openly gay YA.

For all the reasons above, I may have omitted some YA titles that others would count as "LGBTQ YA," either on purpose or by accident.

The list of books that I've identified as LGBTQ YA comes from several sources. Thanks first of all to the American Library Association's Rainbow List, particularly the chairs of the 2016 and 2017 committees, for sharing with me their raw data on LGBTQ YA titles published in 2015 and 2016. Thanks also to Rob Bittner for helping me out with this. I cross-referenced this raw data with Amanda MacGregor's blog posts on "What's New in LGBTQIA+ YA" at Teen Librarian Toolbox. The websites LGBTQ Reads and YA Pride (formerly known as Gay YA) were also valuable resources. Finally, in order to determine whether a book met the criteria for my analysis, I cross-checked the book's jacket copy with numerous book reviews on the internet. It's simply impossible for me to read them all. I take full responsibility for any errors or omissions in my counting.

I'm primarily interested in tracking YA books published by mainstream publishers. By "mainstream" I mean the Big 5 publishers (Hachette, HarperCollins, Macmillan, Penguin Random House, and Simon and Schuster); major publishers Disney Book Group, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, and Scholastic; and general interest publishers that do not focus on LGBT books.

General interest publishers range in size from tiny independent presses to relatively large educational publishers. For 2015-16, the general interest publishers include: Abrams Books, Adaptive Books, Akashic Books, Albert Whitman Teen, Arsenal Pulp, Asymmetrical Press, Candlewick, Chronicle Books, Drawn and Quarterly, Dreaming Robot Press, Entangled: Crush, Evernight Teen, Flux, Harlequin Teen, Jolly Fish Press, Lerner Publishing Groups, Luminis Books, Pen Name Publishing, Riverdale Avenue Books, Running Press, Sky Pony Press, Soho Teen, Sourcebooks Fire, Spencer Hill Press, and Three Rooms Press.

I've also been interested in looking at how major commercial publishers publish LGBTQ YA books. These are the biggest publishers in the world, and they publish the books you're most likely to find in your local Barnes & Noble. They include the Big 5 publishers, as well as the following three large publishers: Disney Book Group, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, and Scholastic. When I refer to "major publishers," these are the publishers I mean.

Since 2014, I've chosen to not analyze the output of LGBTQ publishers because my interest lies in analyzing mainstream representation of LGBTQ characters. LGBTQ presses still play an important role in producing stories about LGBTQ experiences, and for those who are interested in looking at how LGBTQ presses represent LGBTQ experiences, I encourage you to visit Bold Strokes Books, Dreamspinner Press, Harmony Ink Press, Interlude Press, and Riptide Publishing. Several recent YA books published by LGBTQ presses have received critical acclaim, including Not Your Sidekick by C. B. Lee (Duet, an imprint of Interlude) and Gravity by Juliann Rich (Bold Strokes Books), which were both Lambda Award Finalists; and The History of Us by Nyrae Dawn (Harmony Ink Press), which was on the 2015 Rainbow List.

How Many LGBTQ YA books were published?

In 2015, mainstream publishers published
54 LGBTQ YA books.

In 2016, mainstream publishers published
79 LGBTQ YA books.

These numbers have increased significantly since 2003, when my data set begins. Among mainstream publishers (all publishers except LGBTQ publishers), the numbers have risen sharply since 2014.

This sharp upturn is even more pronounced among major publishers.

In the past I've sometimes attempted to determine what percentage of YA books published were LGBTQ books, but I've since concluded that it is too difficult for me to accurately determine the total number of YA books published. So, I don't know what percentage of YA books in 2015-16 have LGBTQ main characters, but looking at the charts above, you can see that the number of LGBTQ books has doubled in the last decade.

Gender Representation in 2015-16 LGBTQ YA Novels

Since I began counting LGBTQ YA novels, I've been struggling with how to analyze gender representation. Initially, I wanted to track this because the experiences of lesbians, gay boys, bisexual people, and transgender people differ significantly in real life, and I suspected that all too often, "LGBTQ" books were solely about gay boys while being counted as representing other identities.

As I've learned more about gender, I've learned that separating out lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender is not the best way to understand this. Lesbian, gay, and bisexual are sexual orientations, not gender identities. And transgender people may identify as lesbian, gay, or bisexual, among other identities. That's why I now examine books for whether they feature cisgender girls or boys, transgender girls or boys, or nonbinary or genderfluid characters (for more on these identities, see the Wiki entry on genderqueer).

As our understanding of gender in contemporary American society continues to change, determining and counting a character's gender identity presents unique challenges. Terminology that was believed to be accurate and respectful even five years ago may have since become dated, inaccurate, and even offensive. I understand that the way I count these books may not hold up over time. All I can do is count them to the best of my knowledge right now.

I have chosen to not count characters' sexual orientation; that is, whether they are lesbian, gay, bisexual, pansexual, asexual, or other sexual orientations. Counting sexual orientation is too complex an endeavor for me to do on my own. It would require reading all the books, for one thing, and in cases where characters don't state their sexual orientation on the page, it would require guessing. In these LGBTQ YA novels, characters who are cisgender female typically identify as lesbian, bisexual, or queer. Similarly, characters who are cisgender male typically identify as gay, bisexual, or queer. Transgender characters are fewer in number, and they may identify as heterosexual or queer.

I've sorted the LGBTQ YA novels from 2015-16 into the following categories to track gender representation:

Cisgender Female Main Character - A character who was assigned female at birth and continues to identify as female.

Cisgender Male Main Character - A character who was assigned male at birth and continues to identify as male.

Transgender Female Main Character - A character who was assigned male at birth but whose gender identity is female.

Transgender Male Main Character - A character who was assigned female at birth but whose gender identity is male.

Nonbinary or Genderfluid Main Character - A character who does not identify as male or female; or a character who does not have a fixed gender identity.

Gender-Destabilizing Main Character - This is a category I've invented to count characters who change gender, usually in a speculative fiction context, but are not necessarily transgender.

Multiple Characters of Multiple Genders - Books that are about more than one LGBTQ main character.

Intersex Main Character - Books that are about a main character who is intersex. For more on whether intersex people believe that intersex is a gender, read this post. I've chosen to include intersex in my gender analysis because I believe it's important to highlight these books, and they don't quite fit into the other categories I'm tracking.

Problem Novel Relating to LGBTQ Issues - I realize this is not technically about gender, but I've had to create a category to encompass novelsthat are about a cisgender, straight main character's engagement with LGBTQ issues. The plot is typically about a straight teen's LGBTQ parent or friend.

How did the last two years track with regard to gender representation? Here are the results when examining books published by all mainstream publishers:

In 2015, for the first time there were two books about nonbinary main characters: Lizard Radio by Pat Schmatz (Candlewick), and What We Left Behind by Robin Talley (Harlequin Teen). Talley's novel includes multiple LGBTQ main characters (the other is a cisgender female character), and thus is counted in the Multiple category. There was one novel about an intersex main character, None of the Above by I. W. Gregorio (Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins).

In 2016, for the first time there were six novels about transgender main characters: four about trans girls, and two about trans boys. Also in 2016, there were three openly trans authors: Susan Jane Bigelow, author of The Demon Girl's Song (Dreaming Robot); T Cooper, co-author with Allison Glock-Cooper of Changers Book Three: Kim (Black Sheep/Akashic); and Meredith Russo, author of If I Was Your Girl (Flatiron Books/Macmillan). The Demon Girl's Song is a fantasy novel involving gender identity; Changers Book Three: Kim features a gender-destabilizing narrative and main character, and If I Was Your Girl is about a trans girl. This was really a record year for books about trans characters. In 2016 there was also a novel about a nonbinary main character, Symptoms of Being Human by Jeff Garvin.

When I was counting the 2016 books, I was initially surprised to find that more books about cisgender girls were published than about cisgender boys. However, upon closer examination of the data I realized I hadn't fully understood the situation.

Historically, more books about cis boys than cis girls have been published. Here's a chart I made in 2013 covering LGBT Content (this was the terminology I used then) in books published by major publishers from 2003-2013:

As you can see, 45% of LGBTQ YA books were about cis boys, with only 33% about cis girls. That doesn't tell the whole story, however. When I looked back at the data I have on major publishers going back to 2003, I discovered that the number of books about cis girls vs. cis boys has fluctuated year to year.

Usually, more books about cis boys are published, but from 2010-2012 there were more books about cis girls. Since 2012, the number of books about cis boys has outstripped the number of books about cis girls - including in 2016, when major publishers released 22 books about cis boys, and 20 books about cis girls. Remember, this data is only for books published by major publishers, which are the Big 5 plus Disney, HMH, and Scholastic.

When you add in other general interest publishers, more books about cis girls were published in 2016: 32 books, compared to 28 books about cis boys. I only have data on general interest publishers going back to 2012. Taking another look at that data, you can see that the number of books about cis boys vs. cis girls has also fluctuated.

My takeaway from this situation is that while publishers (major and general interest publishers) have historically published more books about cis boys, they are beginning to publish more books about cis girls. The increase in books about cis girls only dates back a few years, though, and it remains to be seen whether the trend for cis girls continues to go up.

Genre Representation in 2015-16 LGBTQ YA Books

Genre breaks down a bit more simply than gender. Here are the genres I've sorted the books into:

Contemporary - Realistic novels set in the contemporary world

Science Fiction and Fantasy

Mystery/Thriller

Historical

Cross-Genre - Novels that don't fit squarely into one genre

Graphic Novel or Graphic Nonfiction - I realize this includes both fiction and nonfiction, but I've decided the illustrative aspect predominates

Nonfiction - Not novels!

What interests me most is that in the past two years, LGBTQ YA books have branched out into several different genres, even beyond science fiction and fantasy. For the vast majority of the time that LGBTQ YA novels have been published, they've predominantly been in the contemporary genre. I think it shows that LGBTQ YA books are moving away from problems and issues, and LGBTQ characters are increasingly depicted in stories that aren't focused on their sexual orientation or gender identity.

In Conclusion

It's clear to me that the discourse on diversity in YA publishing, especially fueled by We Need Diverse and other diversity advocates, has had a measurable impact on the number of LGBTQ YA books being published. I can't explain the significant spike in LGBTQ YA books in any other way.

The downside is that some of these books include story lines that seem incredibly questionable and likely offensive. For example, Look Past by Eric Devine (Running Press) is about a murderer taunting a trans boy and demanding that he "repent for changing his gender identity, or he will be the next one killed" (quote from book jacket).

I am conflicted about counting books like Look Past in these analyses. They do count, technically, but I would not recommend a book like that to a queer or trans teen. At the same time, I believe that writers need the freedom to push boundaries and to write about horrific experiences. It's undeniable that LGBTQ teens do experience horrific things, and I don't think that books about LGBTQ teens - or any teens - should be limited to positive stories with morally upright happy endings.

Ultimately, I think the increase in the number of LGBTQ YA books being published is a good thing, as long as we are mindful of the complexity of LGBTQ experiences and identities, and recognize that not every book can appeal to every reader. And of course, some books are terrible. There is no escaping that. However, I feel strongly that the positive growth in LGBTQ YA cannot be denied, and it is not diminished by a few bad apples. It's important to keep in mind the broader context of decades of publishing, in which LGBTQ books were initially not published at all or were limited to problem novels without happy endings for their queer protagonists. We have truly come a long way.

If you're interested in the books I used for this analysis, here's the list of LGBTQ YA published in 2015 and 2016. While I've made every effort to avoid mistakes, at the end of the day I'm the only one working on this, and errors may have slipped through.

Finally, this kind of analysis takes a lot of work. Over the years, I've spent weeks working on these statistical posts. It's been really fulfilling to me to know that they're useful for librarians and academics and general readers and the publishing industry. I'm happy to share them with the public for free. However, they take a lot of time to put together. If you find these posts useful, please show your support by buying a copy of one of my books. In fact, my next novel, A Line in the Dark, comes out Oct. 17. You can preorder it here, or buy it at your online retailer of choice. Thank you!

Update 10/12/17 at 2:44 p.m.: Due to a coding error, None of the Above by I.W. Gregorio was initially folded into the wrong category and thus an earlier version of this post did not count any novels about intersex characters. That has now been corrected and the charts and text have been updated to reflect this.

Update 10/25/17: Thanks to a reader who informed me that Susan Jane Bigelow is also an out trans author; I've updated the post to reflect this.

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LGBTQ YA by the Numbers: 2015-16 - Malinda Lo

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Since 2011, I've been tracking the number of young adult books about LGBTQ characters. Here are my statistics from 2011 , 2012 , 2013 , and 2014 , as well as an overview of LGBT YA published by mainstream publishers from 2003-13 .

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Edit the Padlet below to share your resources and ideas for #indivisble10

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#Indivisible10: Share Your Ideas & Resources

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Resources for Conversations in Social Justice. Literature for Children and Adolescents (Center for Teaching through Children's Books

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Southern Poverty Law Center monitors hate groups and other extremists throughout the U.S. and exposes their activities to law enforcement agencies, the media and the public.

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Understanding how school discipline policies can contribute to the school-to-prison pipeline is essential for educators and families. Harsh punishments, automatic out-of-class time and police involvement for discipline can push young people out of classrooms and into the criminal legal system. But educators, parents and caregivers can help to change this harmful system by advocating for and implementing practices that prioritize mental health and well-being.

We offer this new resource page that highlights LFJ articles and content to open dialogue, shift practices and foster change to benefit all young people.

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Learning for Justice | Education Resources

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Learning for Justice provides free resources to educators-teachers, administrators, counselors and other practitioners-who work with children from kindergarten through high school. Educators use our materials to supplement the curriculum, to inform their practices, and to create civil and inclusive school communities where children are respected, valued and welcome participants.

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On October 9th, the Illinois Safe Schools Alliance and our wonderful community partners are cultivating a day-long gathering of students, parents, PreK-12 teachers and administrators, lawyers, healthcare professionals, and advocates to share skills and clarify shared goals for the work of the safe schools movement in the months and years ahead.

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Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center

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Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center

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TAKE A STAND CENTER

Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center's new Take a Stand Center, a breakthrough exhibition, will lead visitors from Knowledge to Inspiration to Action action, with the 4,000-square-foot Center comprised of three unique and interactive galleries: the Abe & Ida Cooper Survivor Stories Experience, Goodman Upstander Gallery, and Take a Stand Lab.
ABE & IDA COOPER SURVIVOR STORIES EXPERIENCE
This first in the world experience utilizes groundbreaking technology to enable a 'conversation' with 13 recorded Holocaust survivors via 3-D holography, preserving their stories for generations to come. The technology, developed by USC Shoah Foundation's New Dimensions in Testimony program, combines high-definition holographic interview recordings and voice recognition technology to enable Survivors to tell their deeply moving personal stories and then respond to questions from the audience, inviting one-on-one 'conversation.'
GOODMAN UPSTANDER GALLERY
This gallery extends the message beyond the Holocaust to showcase 40 courageous "Upstanders" throughout history and today, striving in the areas of civic, social, economic and environmental rights.

This action-oriented Lab puts the power of change in visitors' hands and provides hands-on tools for affecting change-and becoming an Upstander-including a toolkit for visitors to take home.
Click here to view activism styles and tools.

Grand Opening
Sunday, October 29, 10:00 am - 5:00 pm
Celebrate the opening of the new Take a Stand Center with a day of exploration and activities including the opportunity to hear from the Survivors filmed for the Survivor Stories Experience, musical performances, and spoken-word poetry.

Check back soon to reserve your spot.
PRINT/BLOG
Hadassah Magazine| Virtual Holocaust Education Interactive Exhibit
Read online>
TV
KCET| Holocaust Survivor Holograms Give History New Depth
Read online>
RADIO
For the Press

Click here to access downloadable photos, FAQs, bios, press releases, and more.

Learn More
To view full screen, click the bottom right corner of the box.

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Take a Stand Center " Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center

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The Illinois Holocaust Museum tells the story of the Holocaust through interactive exhibitions that move and inspire. World-class special exhibitions explore broad themes related to the mission of the Museum which aim to foster the promotion of human rights and the elimination of genocide.

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"I believe in the power of Facing History."

-Durias D., Facing History Alum

"I went to a Facing History workshop and it opened my eyes."

-Tareeq R., Educator

Facing History & Ourselves
uses lessons of history
to challenge teachers
and their students
to stand up to bigotry and hate.

Facing History & Ourselves is more than our name. It is an active and continuous process that calls on each of us to connect the choices of the past to those we face today. To build a more just and equitable future, we must face our history in all its complexity, Are you ready to face history with us?

Learn how you can experience Facing History

Facing History has thousands of research-based resources and professional learning events to support Social Studies and English Language Arts education.

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And hopefully, they will always remember what happened to us and make sure that it won't happen again.

Sonia Weitz, Holocaust survivor and poet

Sign up to download the PDF version of our textbook, Holocaust and Human Behavior.

Facing History students are 94% more likely than their peers to report that their class motivated them to learn.

92% of Facing History teachers agree that Facing History helps their students stand up for what they believe even when others disagree.

91% of elective teachers agree or strongly agree that their Facing History course promoted their students' abilities to ground reading, writing, and speaking in evidence from text.

Demand for our work is greater than ever. Make a 100% tax-deductible donation today and you'll help us reach even more teachers and students around the world, giving them the tools to stand up to bigotry and hate.

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Facing History & Ourselves uses lessons of history to challenge teachers and their students to stand up to bigotry and hate.

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Choosing to Participate from Facing History and Ourselves

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Choosing to Participate from Facing History and Ourselves

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Teaching for Change provides teachers and parents with the tools to create schools where students learn to read, write and change the world.

By drawing direct connections to real world issues, Teaching for Change encourages teachers and students to question and re-think the world inside and outside their classrooms, build a more equitable, multicultural society, and become active global citizens.

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Teaching for Change provides teachers and parents with the tools to create schools where students learn to read, write and change the world. By drawing direct connections to real world issues, Teaching for Change encourages teachers and students to question and re-think the world inside and outside their classrooms, build a more equitable, multicultural society, and become active global citizens.

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The Book Stall | 75 Years of Independent Bookselling on Chicago's North Shore

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Candlewick Press, based in Somerville, Massachusetts, publishes outstanding children�s books for readers of all ages. Since we first opened our doors in 1991, we�ve received more than 300 accolades and honors, and have been named the fastest growing children�s publisher in the U.S. by Publishers Weekly.

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Diversity Panel Members at Creating Stories for Every Reader - Diversity in Your Work. Front left to right: Jan Spivey Gilchrist, Claudia Guadalupe Martinez, Andrea Hall and Patricia Hruby Powell. Back left to right: Gwendolyn Mitchell, Jerome Pohlen and Cynthea Liu.

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Diversity Panel Members at Creating Stories for Every Reader - Diversity in Your Work. Front left to right: Jan Spivey Gilchrist, Claudia Guadalupe Martinez, Andrea Hall and Patricia Hruby Powell. Back left to right: Gwendolyn Mitchell, Jerome Pohlen and Cynthea Liu. *

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Official Tumblr of the #WeNeedDiverseBooks Campaign

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1. An Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir 2. The Wrath and the Dawn by Renee Ahdieh 3. To All the Boys I've Loved Before by Jenny Han 4. Angelfall by Susan Ee 5. The Young Elites by Marie Lu 6. Written in the Stars by Aisha Saeed (tw: rape) 7.

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After WNDB was formed in 2014, our team traveled across the country to conferences and book festivals where they heard a common theme - diverse books can be hard to find. That's why we created OurStory to help address this problem.

The OurStory app is a tool that highlights books with diverse content and by content creators from marginalized communities.

For more details about the OurStory app, contact Dhonielle Clayton:dhonielleclayton@wndb.local.

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After WNDB was formed in 2014, our team traveled across the country to conferences and book festivals where they heard a common theme - diverse books can be hard to find. That's why we created OurStory to help address this problem.

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Cooperative Children's Book Center (CCBC) 

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Cooperative Children's Book Center (CCBC) 

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Cooperative Children's Book Center (CCBC)

The CCBC is a unique and vital gathering place for books, ideas, and expertise in the field of children's and young adult literature. The CCBC is a noncirculating examination, study, and research library for Wisconsin school and public librarians, teachers, early childhood care providers, university students, and others interested in children's and young adult literature. The CCBC is part of the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Education, and receives additional support from the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction. More about the CCBC.

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The Cooperative Children's Book Center (CCBC) is a unique and vital gathering place for books, ideas, and expertise in the field of children's and young adult literature.

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WPC is a conference that examines challenging concepts of privilege and oppression and offers solutions and team building strategies to work toward a more equitable world.

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Kay Berkson is a documentary photographer who has photographed in Chicago communities for decades. In the 1980's, she became active in human rights work with Central American refugees who sought political asylum in the U.S. Her involvement with refugees who wanted to tell their stories led to her interest in oral history and to the idea for the Changing Worlds photography and oral history project.

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EdChange - Advocating Equity in Schools and Society

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A collective of educational equity specialists offering professional development and free resources for educators.

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Today, we welcome over 40 participants to the first session of the 31st year of SEED New Leaders Week. They will spend their time immersed in multicultural SEED materials and methods in preparation for leading their own SEED seminars -- a group of individuals who meet regularly to learn about themselves, interact with each other across identities, and develop strategies for greater equity and diversity in their local settings.

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TeachingBooks | Author & Book Resources to Support Reading Education

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TeachingBooks strives to enrich everyone's experience reading children's and young adult books with our original and curated literary resources.

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What does an American look like? Who is welcome in this country? What is every American's duty in the face of racist government action?

Alphawood Gallery has partnered with the Japanese American Service Committee (JASC) to produce the Gallery's first original exhibition, Then They Came for M e: Incarceration of Japanese Americans during WWII and the Demise of Civil Liberties. This exhibition examines a dark episode in U.S. history when, in the name of national security, the government incarcerated 120,000 citizens and legal residents during World War II without due process or other constitutional protections to which they were entitled. Executive Order 9066, signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt on February 19, 1942, set in motion the forced removal and imprisonment of all people of Japanese ancestry living on or near the West Coast. During this 75 th anniversary year of the executive order, we look back at this shameful past to learn lessons for our present and future in the face of new challenges encouraged by fearmongering and racism at the highest levels of government.

Then They Came for Me presents this historical event from multiple perspectives. Drawing upon the powerful images culled from the book Un-American: The Incarceration of Japanese Americans During World War II by Chicago-based photo historians Richard Cahan and Michael Williams, the exhibition features works by renowned American photographers Dorothea Lange, Ansel Adams and others documenting the eviction of Japanese Americans from their homes and their subsequent lives in incarceration camps. These photographers were hired by the U.S. Government's War Relocation Authority (WRA) to record the "evacuation" and "internment" process. In addition to the WRA photographers, the exhibition presents views of the incarceration by Japanese American artists Toyo Miyatake and Miné Okubo. A significant group of images by Miyatake, a professional photographer who was incarcerated at the Manzanar Relocation Center, reveal details of the camps prohibited in WRA photography such as barbed wire and guard towers, and are shown alongside his illuminating images of the imprisoned residents' daily lives. And pages from Miné Okubo's remarkable illustrated memoir Citizen 13660 document her own incarceration experience with poignant drawings and forthright text.

The JASC and a number of collectors from the Chicago area have generously lent art, objects, documents and other historical materials that provide glimpses into the personal experiences of those who were incarcerated. Highlights include ID cards and tags, anti-Japanese propaganda, suitcases, diaries, handmade furniture, wood carvings and other works of art, high school yearbooks and newsletters produced by camp inmates, military accoutrements, indefinite leave clearances, materials related to resettlement in Chicago and eventual redress and reparation. Specially compiled video testimonies by former inmates, their family members and community leaders are installed throughout the exhibition. And the new documentary film And Then They Came for Us by Abby Ginzberg and Ken Schneider, screened daily, makes explicit connections between the Japanese American incarceration story and current concerns with regard to the treatment of Muslims and Muslim Americans.

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What does an American look like? Who is welcome in this country? What is every American's duty in the face of racist government action? Alphawood Gallery has partnered with the Japanese American Service Committee (JASC) to produce the Gallery's first original exhibition, Then They Came for M e : Incarceration of Japanese Americans during WWII and the Demise of Civil Liberties.

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Densho’s mission is to preserve the testimonies of Japanese Americans who were unjustly incarcerated during World War II before their memories are extinguished.

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Densho: Japanese American Incarceration and Japanese Internment

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+ Japanese American National Museum Founders' Award

+ Association of King County Historical Organizations Charles Payton Award for Cultural Advocacy

+ City of Seattle Mayor's Arts Award for Cultural Preservation

+ Stetson Kennedy Vox Populi Award of the Oral History Association

+ Society of American Archivists Hamer-Kegan Award

+ American Library Association Online History Award

+ Association of King County Historical Organizations Long Term Project Award

+ Washington State Historical Society David Douglas Award

+ Humanities Washington Award

+ Japanese American Citizens League Biennium Award

+ Japanese Community Services of Seattle Award

+ Nisei Veterans Committee of Seattle Commanders Award

+ NPower Innovation Award

+ 2016 Annual Report

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About Densho - Densho: Japanese American Incarceration and Japanese Internment

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Japanese American National Museum Founders' Award + Association of King County Historical Organizations Charles Payton Award for Cultural Advocacy + City of Seattle Mayor's Arts Award for Cultural Preservation + Stetson Kennedy Vox Populi Award of the Oral History Association + Society of American Archivists Hamer-Kegan Award + American Library

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San Mateo's Independent Bookstore. We offer books, toys, teacher resources, and ethically produced/fair trade gifts for all ages focused on Peacemaking, Sustainable Living, Gender Equality.

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SLJ Diversity and Cultural Literacy Syllabus 

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SLJ Diversity and Cultural Literacy Syllabus 

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Summer 2016 online course
Week 1: Invisibility and Appropriation
Colorblind Ideology Is a Form of Racism by Monnica T. Williams, Ph. D. (from Psychology Today)

When You're Invisible, Every Representation Matters (from Native Appropriations blog)

A Cultural Conundrum: Exploring Cultural Appropriation in Children's Literature (from The Book Wars blog)

We [Native Peoples] Are Not People of Color by Debbie Reese

The Danger of a Single Story | Chimamanda Adichie
Special Guest Keynote:
American Indians in Children's Literature | Debbie Reese
Week 2: Stereotyping
Straight Talk on Race: Challenging the Stereotypes in Kids' Books (article by Mitali Perkins, SLJ, April 2009)

The Difference Between Stereotypes, Tropes, and Archetypes (from WriteWorld.org)

Stereotypes: Negative Racial Stereotypes and Their Affect on Attitudes Toward African-Americans (Perspectives on Multiculturalism and Diversity)

Disability Tropes (from Disability in Kid Lit blog)

Stories for All (posts from Shannon Hale and other writers discussing the harm in gendering books)

The Duty of Professional Reviews (post from Reading While White on importance of professional reviews addressing racist and problematic content)

Contesting Ideology in Children's Book Reviewing (article by Debbie Reese from Studies in American Indian Literatures)

The Gender Coverup (article from Maureen Johnson on gendered book covers in YA)

Representation and the Media | Stuart Hall

Stereotypes in Children's Literature | Toby Rajput

Why Do You Think Stereotypes Are True? | Decoded/MTV
Week 3: White Privilege and Unconscious Bias Articles:
White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Backpack by Peggy McIntosh
White Supremacy Culture
On Racism and White Privilege (from Teaching Tolerance)

On Being White: A Raw, Honest Conversation by Allie Jane Bruce ( Children & Libraries, Fall 2015)

Can We Talk About Whiteness? (NPR's Code Switch podcast)
Additional Reading:
10 Ways White People Are More Racist Than They Realize by Kalli Holloway (Salon via Alternet)

What White Children Need to Know About Race (from NAIS)

The All-Too-Familiar Fog of White Authenticating by Nina Lindsay (on the Reading While White blog)
Videos: What Is Privilege? How the Biases in the Back of Your Mind Affect How You Feel About Race How To Talk About Race Week 4: Microaggressions | Eric Deggans/TEDx | PBS Newshour Additional Reading: | Buzzfeed
Microaggressions Matter (from The Atlantic)
More readings, as recommended in our live chat with Malinda Lo: Crystallizing Microaggressions Culturally Generic/Neutral? The Road to Heck NLGJA Stylebook Microaggressions in Everyday Life
Perceptions of Diversity in Book Reviews by Malinda Lo (from Diversity in YA blog)

Microaggressions.com, a visual representation of everyday microaggressions.

Microaggressions in Everyday Life (from the University of Missouri)

Racial Microaggressions: Comments That Sting | NYTimes
Week 5: Intersectionality

What Is Intersectionality? (from SRS Discussion Forum)
Intersectionality Week 6: Cultural Authenticity and Authorial Responsibility
Broadening Feminism(s): Intersectionality 101 (from LIP)

Rethinking Sexism: How Trans Women Challenge Feminism (alternet)

Sometimes Intersectionality Means You STFU by April Hathcock (At the Intersection blog)
Additional Reading:
Who Can Tell My Story? by Jacqueline Woodson ( Horn Book, Jan/Feb 1998)

Writing About Race (from Connecting YA)
Week 7: Historical Accuracy, Smiling Slaves, and Recent Controversies
Evaluating Cultural Authenticity in Multicultural Picture Books ( Library Quarterly, 2014)

Sensitivity Readers and Why I Pulled a Project (from Debut Author series on Mary Robinette Kowal blog)

Cultural Authenticity | Rudine Sims Bishop

"Self-censorship" of Children's Book Depicting Smiling Slave Condemned by Alison Flood ( The Guardian, Jan. 25, 2016)

The Real Censorship in Children's Books: Smiling Slaves Is Just the Half of It by Daniel José Older ( The Guardian, Jan. 29, 2016)

How Two "Slavery with a Smile" Controversies Are Changing the Conversation About Diverse Children's Books by Sarah Seltzer (Flavorwire, Feb. 25, 2016)
Additional Reading
A Native Perspective of Laura Amy Schlitz's The Hired Girl by Debbie Reese (American Indians in Children's Literature)

Which Book Will Hurt Which Reader How? by Roger Sutton (Read Roger, Horn Book blog) **Don't miss the discussion in the comments.**

Accuracy or Bias: On Prejudicial Characters in Children's Literature and Beyond by Justine Ireland (Bookriot)

Thoughts On "But Kids Say This Stuff!" by Allie Jane Bruce (Reading While White blog)

Are Historical Heroes Allowed to Have Prejudices in Children's Literature? by Betsy Bird (from Fuse 8 blog)

The Pocahontas Paradox: A Cautionary Tale for Educators by Cornel Pewewardy (Journal of Navajo Education, 1996/7)
Additional Reading Up for Discussion: When Is It Okay to Mention "Diversity" in a Review?
"Huckleberry Finn" and the N-word | 60 Minutes
Week 8: Reading and Evaluating Through a Diverse Lens
Special Guest Keynote:
I Gave a Speech About Race to the Publishing Industry and No One Heard Me by Mira Jacob (via Buzzfeed)

Milestones for Diversity in Children's Literature and Library Services by KT Horning ( Children & Libraries, Fall 2015)

Ten Steps for Reviewing Books (from NAEYC)

Reviewing Through a Diverse Lens | KT Horning

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SLJ Diversity and Cultural Literacy Syllabus

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Summer 2016 online course Week 1: Invisibility and Appropriation Colorblind Ideology Is a Form of Racism by Monnica T. Williams, Ph. D.

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The Zinn Education Project is my compass in a sea of corporate textbooks, packaged common core curriculum and standardized testing. My entire curriculum is based on lessons that can be found on the Zinn Education Project.

High School Social Studies Teacher, Portland, Ore.

Your support is needed to help more students learn people's history. 100% of Zinn Education Project funding comes from individuals like you. Donate today.

By Ursula Wolfe-Rocca

From voter ID laws to voter-roll purges, gerrymandering to poll closures to the deadly in-person voting conditions during a pandemic, the right to vote is under attack and the stakes are high. It is critical that students learn about the fight for voting rights, past and present.

Nov. 25, 1986: Amy Carter Among 60 People Arraigned for...

Teaching About the Violence in Palestine and Israel...

I can UNDERSTAND pessimism, but I don't BELIEVE in it. It's not simply a matter of faith, but of historical EVIDENCE. Not overwhelming evidence, just enough to give HOPE, because for hope we don't need certainty, only POSSIBILITY.

-Howard Zinn

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Zinn Education Project: Teaching People's History

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The Zinn Education Project promotes and supports the teaching of people's history in middle and high school classrooms across the country. Based on the lens of history highlighted in Howard Zinn's best-selling book A People's History of the United States, the website offers free, downloadable lessons and articles organized by theme, time period, and reading level.

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Gene Luen Yang is the National Ambassador for Young People's Literature. He began drawing comic books in the fifth grade, and in 1997 he received a Xeric Grant for his first comic, Gordon Yamamoto and the King of the Geeks. He has since written and drawn a number of titles, including Duncan's Kingdom, The Rosary Comic Book, Prime Baby and Animal Crackers. American Born Chinese, his first graphic novel from First Second, was a National Book Award finalist, as well as the winner of the Printz Award and an Eisner Award. He also won an Eisner for The Eternal Smile, a collaboration with Derek Kirk Kim. He is the author of the Secret Coders series (with artist Mike Holmes) and has written for the hit comics Avatar: The Last Airbender and Superman. Yang lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.

To learn more about his work as the National Ambassador for Young People's Literature, .

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Gene Luen Yang is the National Ambassador for Young People's Literature. He began drawing comic books in the fifth grade, and in 1997 he received a Xeric Grant for his first comic, Gordon Yamamoto and the King of the Geeks.

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Not In Our Town is a movement to stop hate, racism and bullying, and build safe, inclusive communities for all.

PREVIEW OUR NEW FILM

Repairing the World: Stories from the Tree of Life
A new feature documentary and community engagement project from Not In Our Town about Pittsburgh's powerful response to hate and antisemitism. Watch the trailer, find resources, and get involved at repairingtheworldfilm.org →

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Not In Our Town is a movement to stop hate, racism and bullying, and build safe, inclusive communities for all. Repairing the World: Stories from the Tree of Life A new feature documentary and community engagement project from Not In Our Town about Pittsburgh's powerful response to hate and antisemitism.

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Have you ever used the phrase "Mirrors and Windows" when discussing the need for more diverse children's books? If so - or even if you've only heard someone else speak these words in this context - give a tip of your cap to Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop.

On Monday at the Youth Media Awards in Atlanta, Dr. Bishop received a standing ovation after winning the Coretta Scott King-Virginia Hamilton Award for Lifetime Achievement. How many of us were thinking, "It's about damn time!" Dr. Bishop, Professor Emerita at Ohio State University, has done enough to push children's literature forward for two or three lifetimes. Check the Reading Rockets site for several video interviews and a handful of links (one of which connects to her seminal essay, Mirrors, Windows and Sliding Glass Doors) .

The idea behind Dr. Bishop's work is simple: all young readers need more books with characters of all ethnicities and backgrounds, having a diverse range of experiences. This doesn't mean that African American children only need to see more books with characters like themselves (although obviously they do), or that Ojibwe children need to see more books with characters like themselves (might I add, only ), and so on; but that African American children need to in the present tense see those Ojibwe characters, and vice versa. And also, children from non-marginalized groups (read: White kids) to see these aforementioned books too. When White kids see White characters all the time, they get a distorted view of reality. White kids are overwhelmingly seeing "mirrors" but not "windows," and that's a huge problem. also need

(By the way, earlier I mentioned the need to tip one's hat to Dr. Bishop when talking about windows and mirrors. Let me take that a step further: we must give credit where credit is due by citing Rudine when we use this phrase, no matter the situation. This is really a good guideline to follow in general, but especially since many White people tend to take credit for ideas and things created by people of color or First/Native Nations, I implore readers to attribute this phrase to Dr. Bishop.)

This may all be old news to some, but one of the reasons Dr. Bishop is so impactful is her years of service, of pushing and prodding the children's literature world to think more broadly about what diverse books can do. And she has done so for all these years with characteristic grace and understated authority, leading by example.

I had the great fortune of serving on the Coretta Scott King Book Award Jury these last two years with Dr. Bishop as my chair. When you're on a book award committee, you get to know the other people in the room extremely well, and it isn't always rainbows and ponies, as they say; things can get heated at times. Discussions hit brick walls, and committee members get feelings hurt - we have such personal attachments to the books we have read and loved! There were a few times I wanted Dr. Bishop to tell us what to do in these hard situations: "Come on," I'd think. "You're RUDINE SIMS BISHOP!! You have more knowledge than the rest of us combined! DRAW US A MAP!!!" But that isn't the way Dr. Bishop works. She is not someone who is going to tell you what to do, or what to think; Rudine Sims Bishop does not direct. When Rudine speaks, the whole room leans forward, and not just because she has such a quiet voice. Dr. Bishop exudes authority, but not the kind that demands one snap to attention. Her authority lies in her knowledge, yes, but above all in the graceful and dignified way she carries herself.

All of this is to say: thank you, Dr. Bishop. Thank you for your tireless and continued work. Thank you for being a shining example of true leadership.

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Have you ever used the phrase "Mirrors and Windows" when discussing the need for more diverse children's books? If so - or even if you've only heard someone else speak these words in this context - give a tip of your cap to Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop.

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Disrupting a Destructive Cycle: How Literacy Drives Social Change

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Disrupting a Destructive Cycle: How Literacy Drives Social Change

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Facebook Live Video

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International Literacy Association, Newark, Delaware. 74K likes. ILA is a global advocacy and membership organization dedicated to transforming lives through literacy.

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Accept, Don't just Tolerate by Padma Venkatraman  

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Accept, Don't just Tolerate by Padma Venkatraman  

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Thanks to the dedication of the talented members of We Need Diverse Books, and those who have been fighting to increase the number of diverse kids' books before this organization was founded, we are starting to recognize the need for books that feature a variety of communities, cultures, and backgrounds. However, one aspect of diversity remains taboo: religion.

The shocking prevalence of Islamophobia has encouraged some to shine a well-deserved spotlight on books featuring authentic Muslim characters. Wonderful, but not enough.

Prejudice against Islam may erode if we educate ourselves about it, but it doesn't get at the root of the problem. It doesn't prevent intolerance about other belief systems (including atheism or agnosticism) from flaring up at another time. It doesn't address stereotypes about other minority religions, either-particularly those deemed "primitive" or "polytheistic."

The protagonists of my novels ( A Time to Dance, Island's End, and Climbing the Stairs) hail from faiths that are much misunderstood. All three books were released to multiple starred reviews and garnered several major honors and awards, for which I'm deeply grateful. But accolades haven't erased the discomfort some feel regarding my protagonists' religious backgrounds. I've often been told my books can't be shortlisted or highlighted or showcased or adopted because of my protagonists' spirituality-although work that is far more strongly infused with religion than mine (Hinduism) but written by authors from majority religions (at least in the United States) is accepted unquestioningly. Occasionally on school visits, I've even been asked to ignore students' questions pertaining to religion. If I'm not allowed to clarify concepts, how will my listeners ever rid themselves of misconceptions?

To eradicate religious stereotypes, we must break the silence surrounding them. Our nation is secular, but our culture is uncomfortable with public religious discourse. On the rare occasions when we recognize our religious differences, we're usually terrified to openly discuss them. We fear we may offend others or incite public outrage.

Yet if we wish to be inclusive, we must speak up. Not to proselytize or preach but to break down walls built by ignorance. We must accept, not merely tolerate. Authors mustn't fear to acknowledge and explain their beliefs if asked. Teachers and librarians need to expand collections beyond holiday picture books and explore novels featuring our religious diversity.

Books are more than mere mirrors or windows; they are keys to compassion. And novels don't just expose readers to differences, they allow readers to experience diversity. They allow us to live within another's skin, think another's thoughts, feel the depths of another's soul. Novels transport, transform, and, most importantly, allow us to transcend prejudice. When we immerse ourselves in characters whose religions are different than our own, our empathy is enhanced. We move closer to embracing people of all religions.

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Accept, Don't Just Tolerate | Kirkus Reviews

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Thanks to the dedication of the talented members of We Need Diverse Books, and those who have been fighting to increase the number of diverse kids' books before this organization was founded, we are starting to recognize the need for books that feature a variety of communities, cultures, and backgrounds.

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Imagine Yourself a Young Reader in the Margins 

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Imagine Yourself a Young Reader in the Margins 

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By Ebony Elizabeth Thomas on

In reading, literacy, and English education, #OwnVoices is not a new conversation. Centering the perspectives of the marginalized has been the focus of decades of struggle over curriculum. Literacy education has long been informed by Louise Rosenblatt's influential reader response theory, which emphasized the dialogic construction of relationships between readers, texts, and authors. Rosenblatt characterized the relationship between readers and writers as a transaction. In other words, readers and writers both have stakes in the exchange that happens-stakes that are mediated by the stories that they share.

Those of us who hold literacy to be a transactional social practice believe that meaning is never located solely in texts, but instead is made through the work of readers as they relate to, interact with, and understand stories. Different readers bring to each reading experience their identities and social subjectivities, because no two readers have the same lived experiences. Thus, there is a long tradition in my field of inviting the perspectives of readers into the act of interpretation.

Elisa Gall, director of library services at a Chicago independent school

Christine Scheper, children's materials specialist, Queens (NY) Library

The ways that we interpret both the "word" and the "world" differ according to who we are, as Paulo Freire and Donaldo Macedo write in their book Literacy: Reading the Word and the World (Routledge, 2005). "Reading does not consist merely of decoding the written word or language; rather, it is preceded by and intertwined with knowledge of the world," they write. However, a challenge for literacy education is that most books for children and young adults do not seem to imagine a diverse readership. This is problematic at a time when half of the children in our nation's schools are from diverse backgrounds with a myriad of experiences in the world.

If you do not understand why many of us advocate for better representation in literature and the media, imagine yourself as a young reader from the margins. Imagine never seeing yourself in much of what you read growing up, or in most of children's television or teen TV that you viewed. Now imagine one day opening a book or turning on the TV and seeing a melted, warped version of yourself, your family and friends, and your home and neighborhood. You turn the page or flip the channel, and find much of what you are, know, and love is two-dimensional and flattened. A funhouse mirror version of the self.

Now imagine facing this imaginary version of you for most of the first two decades of your life as a precondition for entering adulthood.

That's not me, you think. But when you are young, your mind, heart, and imagination are searching for all the mirrors, windows, and doors into experiences that you can find.

Eventually, one begins to think, Maybe this is me. Maybe this is what people who are like me really are like. Or you resist these representations, decide that you don't really like reading, and end up falling behind in school.

It's not that some authors from historically privileged and powerful groups who write diverse characters and settings aren't incredibly well meaning. It's not that some haven't done a fine job of telling stories from the outside. It's not that these authors haven't done extensive research. Some have commitments to the communities they are writing about, even living among them. When outsider writing comes from a place of deep empathy and commitment to humanization, it can succeed.

However, the #OwnVoices conversation is not only about the ability of authors to tell stories from the outside. Just because someone can write a story doesn't mean that they should write it, no matter how well-intentioned they are. Intentionality is only one part of the story.

As a friend once told me when I was angrily indignant by how an action of mine was interpreted: "Ebony, your good intentions are beside the point if others are harmed by your actions." I took that advice to heart. I believe the least we can do is listen to critiques-without defensiveness-and attempt to move toward risky, yet courageous conversations about how we continue to press forward in an increasingly virtual/digital world that is rife with social inequality, economic precarity, and political uncertainty.

Here is an uncomfortable truth: in children's and young adult literature, Whiteness has long been the dominant narrative perspective. White authors have heretofore been allowed to tell any story, set anywhere, about anyone. Toni Morrison noted this about the U.S. literary landscape 25 years ago in Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination (Harvard University Press, 1992); little has changed since then. Conversely, authors of color can barely publish on their own cultures. And they certainly don't get to tell everyone's story.

I have always advocated that any author can tell any story, as long as they do their research and tell it well. But what we have now is a landscape where most of the human experience is overwhelmingly narrated from a very narrow perspective.

That cannot stand. That will not stand.

The choices that children's publishers in New York, teen TV-show runners in Los Angeles, teachers in Detroit, and librarians in rural Kansas are making today will have consequences deep into this century, and into the next. That is because today's children are growing up with not only a single story, but overwhelmingly, a single literary perspective. Their imaginations are being shaped now.

In literacy classrooms all over the United States, students from all backgrounds are encouraged to read and respond to literature from their own perspectives.

What would it look like if children's publishing valued #OwnVoices as much?
Ebony Elizabeth Thomas is an assistant professor in the Graduate School of Education at the University of Pennsylvania. A former Detroit Public Schools teacher, Thomas's program of research is most keenly focused on children's and adolescent literature, the teaching of African American literature, and the role of race in English language arts classroom discourse and interaction.

This article was featured in our free Extra Helping enewsletter.
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Imagine Yourself a Young Reader in the Margins | #OwnVoices: Three Takes

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By Ebony Elizabeth Thomas on In reading, literacy, and English education, #OwnVoices is not a new conversation. Centering the perspectives of the marginalized has been the focus of decades of struggle over curriculum. Literacy education has long been informed by Louise Rosenblatt's influential reader response theory, which emphasized the dialogic construction of relationships between readers, texts, and authors.

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History/Politics
Bordewich, Fergus M. Killing The White Man's Indian; The Reinvention of Native Americans at the End of the 20th Century. New York: Anchor; 1st Anchor Books Trade Pbk. Ed edition, 1997.
Boye, Alan. Holding Stone Hands: On the Trail of the Cheyenne Exodus. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1999.
Brown, Dee. Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee. New York: Owl Books, 2001.
Cahn, Edgar S. and David W. Hearne. Our Brother's Keeper: The Indian in White America. Cincinnati: New Community Press, 1972.

Cornell, Stephen. The Return of the Native: American Indian Political Resurgence. New York: Oxford Press, 1998.
Deloria, Vine. Custer Died for Your Sins: An Indian Manifesto. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1969.
Deloria, Vine Jr. and Clifford M. Lytle. American Indians, American justice. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1983.

Deloria, Vine and David Wilkins. Tribes, Treaties, and Constitutional Tribulations. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1999.
Deloria, Vine Jr. Red Earth, White Lies: Native Americans and the Myth of Scientific Fact. Golden: Fulcrum Publishing; Reissue edition, 1997.
Denetdale, Jennifer Nez. Reclaiming Diné History: The Legacies of Navajo Chief Manuelito and Juanita. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2007.

Demos, John Putnam. The Unredeemed Captive. New York: Vintage, 1995

Dorris, Michael and Louise Erdrich. The Broken Cord: A Family's Ongoing Struggle with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. London: Harper Perennial, 1989.

Dorris, Michael. Morning Girl. New York: Hyperion, 1999.

Echo-Hawk, Walter, R. In the Light of Justice: The Rise of Human Rights in Native America and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Golden: Fulcrum Publishing, 2013.

Echo-Hawk, Walter, R. In the Courts of the Conqueror: The 10 Worst Indian Law Cases Ever Decided. Golden: Fulcrum Publishing, 2010.

Fleming, Walter. The Complete Idiot's Guide to Native American History. Royersford: Alpha Publishing, 2003.

Howe, Craig and Kim TallBear. eds. This Stretch of the River: Lakota, Dakota, & Nakota Responses to the Lewis & Clark Expedition and Bicentennial. Rapid City: Oak Lake Writers' Society, 2006.

Johnson, Troy, ed. Contemporary Native American Political Issues. Walnut Creek: Alta Mira Press, 1999.
Limerick, Patricia Nelson. The Legacy of Conquest: The Unbroken Past of the American West. New York: W. W. Norton, 1987. Lyons, Oren. Exiled in the Land of the Free: Democracy, Indian Nations & the U.S. Constitution. Santa Fe: Clear Light Books, 1992.
Mason, Dale. Indian Gaming: Tribal Sovereignty and American Politics. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2000.

McCool, Daniel. Native Waters - Contemporary Indian Water Settlements and the Second Treaty Era. Tucson: The University of Arizona Press, 2002.

Meyer, John ed. American Indians and U.S. Politics: A Companion Reader. Westport: Praeger Paperback, 2002.

Neihardt, John. Black Elk Speak s. Lincoln: Bison Books, 2004.

O'Brien, Sharon. American Indian Tribal Governments. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1989.

O'Brien, Sharon. Roots of Resistance: Land Tenure in New Mexico, 1680-1980. Los Angeles: University of California, 1980.

O'Brien, Sharon. Indians of the Americas: Human Rights and Self-Determination. New York: Zed Books, 1984.

Prucha, Francis Paul. Documents of United State Indians. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2000.

Sale, Kirkpatrick. Conquest of Paradise. New York: Plume, 1991.

Smith, Andrea. Conquest: Sexual Violence And American Indian Genocide. Boulder: South End Press, 2005.

Stannard, David. American Holocaust: The Conquest of the New World. New York: Oxford University Press, 1992.

Sullivan, Robert. A Whale Hunt: How a Native-American Village Did What No One Thought It Could. New York: Scribner, 2002.

Weatherford, Jack. Indian Givers. New York: Ballantine Books, 1989

Wilkins, David E. and K. Tsianina Lomawaima. Uneven Ground: American Indian Sovereignty and Federal Law. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2001.

Wilkins, David E. American Indian Politics and the American Political System. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2002.

Wilkins, David E. American Indian Sovereignty and the U.S. Supreme Court: The Masking of Justice. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1997.

Wilkinson, Charles. American Indians, Time, and the Law. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1987.

Wilkinson, Charles. Blood Struggle. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2005.

Wittstock Waterman, Laura and Dick Bancroft. We Are Still Here: A Photographic History of the American Indian Movement. St. Paul: Borealis Books, 2013.

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Books | First Nations Development Institute

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The staff members of First Nations Development Institute have compiled a list of what they consider to be essential reading for anyone interested in the Native American experience. Certain entries on the list are boldfaced, indicating that the employees of First Nations consider them to be "a goo...

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American Indians in Children's Literature (AICL)  by Dr. Debbie Reese

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American Indians in Children's Literature (AICL)  by Dr. Debbie Reese

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A short history of American Indians in Children’s literature, bios of its co-owners, and why AICL matters

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By Cynthia Leitich Smith
for Cynsations

Check out the cover of Jazz Owls, a Novel of the Zoot Suit Riots by Margarita Engle, illustrated by Rudy Gutierrez (Atheneum, June 2018). Note: a young adult novel-in-verse about the Zoot Suit Riots in 1943.

Margarita says:

"During World War II, my hometown of Los Angeles, California became the scene of riots so strange that they don't seem real, unless viewed through the lens of modern trends toward increasing racial violence.

"Sailors on their way to the battlefields of World War II attacked Mexican-American teenage boys, beating them, stripping them of their zoot suits, and setting the clothing on fire. Unwilling to arrest men in uniform, police arrested the zooters instead.

"Clothes were not the real motive behind these shocking attacks. Interracial swing dancing was the trigger for white supremacist violence.

"I chose to narrate this complex story in free verse, using many voices, including a Mexican-American family, a Cuban musician, policemen, sailors, reporters, and the ghost of a murdered man.

"I hope Jazz Owls will help young readers understand how World War II changed the roles of women, as well as the hopes and dreams of Latinos in the U.S."

Margarita Engle is the 2017-2019 national Young People's Poet Laureate, and the first Latino to receive that honor.

She is the Cuban-American author of many verse novels, including The Surrender Tree, a Newbery Honor winner, and The Lightning Dreamer, a PEN USA Award recipient.

Her verse memoir, Enchanted Air, received the Pura Belpré Award, Golden Kite Award, Walter Dean Myers Honor, Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award, and Arnold Adoff Poetry Award, among others.

Drum Dream Girl received the Charlotte Zolotow Award for best picture book text.

Her newest verse novel about the island is Forest World, and her newest picture books are All the Way to Havana, and Miguel's Brave Knight, Young Cervantes and His Dream of Don Quixote.

Books forthcoming in 2018 include The Flying Girl, How Aída de Acosta learned to Soar, and Jazz Owls, a Novel of the Zoot Suit Riots.

Margarita was born in Los Angeles, but developed a deep attachment to her mother's homeland during childhood summers with relatives. She was trained as an agronomist and botanist. She lives in central California with her husband.

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By Cynthia Leitich Smith for Cynsations Check out the cover of Jazz Owls, a Novel of the Zoot Suit Riots by Margarita Engle, illustrated by Rudy Gutierrez (Atheneum, June 2018). Note: a young adult novel-in-verse about the Zoot Suit Riots in 1943.

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Reading Spark - Dr. Sarah Park Dahlen's website

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Reading Spark - Dr. Sarah Park Dahlen's website

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GSJ 3990 Dismantling Racism: Social Justice & Children's Literature

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Here's the reading list for my Global Search for Justice 3990 Social Justice and Children's Literature course, which I am teaching for the third time for St. Catherine University's undergraduate CORE Curriculum. Bryan, Ashley. Freedom Freedom Over Me: Eleven Slaves, Their Lives and Dreams Brought to Life by Ashley Bryan Budhos, Marina.

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My name is Edith (Edi) Campbell. I'm and African American, able-bodied cis gendered female. I'm an academic librarian who works to improve the literacy of teens of color and am a strong ally for all marginalized young people. As part of this effort, I also work to promote authors of color. Reading multiple varieties of text is the basis for all literacies and in becoming literate, we learn how to navigate the world around us. I currently work as a Reference/Instruction Librarian at Indiana State University.

I can be contacted at crazyquilts at hotmail dot com and I'm found several places around the web.

Tales of An Arabian Knight: I keep this one for sentimental reasons: it's my first blog ever. I created it when I went to Saudi Arabia. My school mascot is the Golden Knight, hence the blog name.

ChikkySoupMeets Stinky Tofu: The blog I maintained while I lived in Taiwan

GoodReads: This is where I maintain an online catalog of my personal library

LibraryThing: Honestly, I prefer LibraryThing to GoodReads but I'm too cheap to pay for the space to add more books which I need to update this library

MySpace: I don't use this one a lot, but it's a great space for connecting to authors

Twitte r: follow me on Twitter! My blog posts automatically post there

Diigo my collection of links for education, literacy, technology and librarianship

Pinterest is where you'll find a more current list of upcoming releases by authors of color as well as boards on my varied interests and hobbies

Facebook Isn't everyone on FB?

The background image for this blog is from SweetChris/ FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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My name is Edith (Edi) Campbell. I'm and African American, able-bodied cis gendered female. I'm an academic librarian who works to improve the literacy of teens of color and am a strong ally for all marginalized young people. As part of this effort, I also work to promote authors of color.

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Welcome to Booktoss a blog where the serious business of reading in schools meets the absurd notion that research based literacy practices don't have to suck the life out of literature.

Booktoss means we, the Literary Gatekeepers, need to be willing to see the problems with books and simply toss them aside. Yes. I said it. Toss the book aside. No burning or censoring (understand the difference between censoring and boycotting, please!). Just get rid of the racist, sexist, homophobic, ableist book and move on. Go and grab another book that doesn't tear a hole in your heart. More and more these great books exist in libraries, online and bookstores. Books that show authentic characters being more than props for over-represented characters.

Then there are the books I want to keep, and hold, and pass on to kids and teachers. Books that provide authentic views of lives and people and events. Books that are complex, complicated, heartfelt and heartening. Because there are great authors that don't need to tear down, dehumanize and objectify one community in order to make a point.

I am currently a lecturer in Boston University School of Education. I earned my PhD from Michigan State University in Educational Psychology and Education Technology with a language and literacy option.

My research focuses on the influence of motivational factors, including intrinsic interest and aesthetic responses, on reading comprehension in adolescents. My dissertation, Out of the Box: Expert Readers Allocating Time and Attention In Graphic Novels, a qualitative multiple case study focused on the ways expert readers utilize metacognitive reading strategies, including allocating time and attention, to mediate the verbal and visual sign systems at work in graphic novels.

Currently, I teach master's level courses in research methods, as well as children's and young adult literature.

Please feel free to contact me with any all all questions about graphic novels in education.

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Welcome to Booktoss a blog where the serious business of reading in schools meets the absurd notion that research based literacy practices don't have to suck the life out of literature. Booktoss means we, the Literary Gatekeepers, need to be willing to see the problems with books and simply toss them aside.

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Don Tate is an award-winning author, and the illustrator of numerous critically acclaimed books for children, including The Cart That Carried Martin, (Charlesbridge); One Hope's Gift, (Penguin); Duke Ellington's Nutcracker Suite (Charlesbridge); She Loved Baseball (HarperCollins); and Ron's Big Mission, (Penguin). He is also the author of It Jes' Happened: When Bill Traylor Started To Draw, an Ezra Jack Keats New Writer Honor winner. Don lives in Austin, Texas, with his family.

Visit Don at http://www.dontate.com/.

Kelly Starling Lyons is a children's book author whose mission is to transform moments, memories and history into stories of discovery. Her books include CCBC Choices-honored picture book, One Million Men and Me, Ellen's Broom, a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor book, Junior Library Guild and Bank Street Best selection, Tea Cakes for Tosh, a Notable Social Studies Trade Book for Young People and Hope's Gift, an IRA/CBC Children's Choices selection, Storytelling World Award winner and SIBA Okra Pick. Her latest picture book is One More Dino on the Floor. A native of Pittsburgh, Kelly lives in North Carolina where she facilitates a book club that celebrates African-American children's book creators of today and the past. [Photo Credit: Zack E. Hamlett, III]

Learn more about Kelly at http://www.kellystarlinglyons.com.

Tameka Fryer Brown (a native of Miami, Florida) has called Charlotte, North Carolina home for the past 19 years. Brown's first literary accomplishment as a children's book writer came when she was awarded one of two First Prizes in the 2008 Cheerios® Spoonfuls of Stories® New Author Contest. In the Fall of 2010, her debut picture book, Around Our Way on Neighbors' Day, was published by Abrams Books for Young Readers. In 2013, the New York Board of Education purchased over 69,000 copies of Around Our Way for its library system.

My Cold Plum Lemon Pie Bluesy Mood is Brown's second picture book. It was published in March of 2013 by Viking Children's Books/Penguin, and illustrated by CSK winner Shane W. Evans. It is the story of a creative boy named Jamie and his emotion-filled day - expressed through the metaphor of color. Written in rhythmic free verse, it also contains themes of family, sibling conflict, self-awareness, and standing up for one's self.

My Cold Plum Lemon Pie Bluesy Mood is a 2014 Charlotte Zolotow Honor Book (for outstanding writing in a picture book), a Bank Street College Best Book of 2014, a CCBC Choices Best Book of 2014, a 2013-2014 Abilene ISD Mockingbird Award nominee, a 2014 SIBA Book Award nominee, a 2014-2015 Star of the North Picture Book Award nominee, and is on the prestigious New York Public Library's 2013 list of 100 Titles for Reading and Sharing.
[Photo Credit: D. E. Photography] Check out Tameka's website at http://www.tamekafryerbrown.com

Olugbemisola Rhuday-Perkovich is the co-author of the NAACP Image Award-nominated TWO NAOMIS, (Balzer and Bray/HarperCollins), a Junior Library Guild Selection. TWO NAOMIS received starred reviews from Kirkus, School Library Journal; Publishers Weekly called it "warm, upbeat, and satisfying. She's also author of the middle grade novel Eighth-Grade Superzero (Arthur A. Levine/Scholastic), a Notable Children's Book for a Global Society (IRA), a Notable Social Studies Trade Book for Young People, and an Amazon Best Book of the Month, now available in paperback.

She has written for various magazines, including American Baby, Healthy Kids, Word up! Rap Masters, Right On!, and Scholastic Instructor. She​ writes for Brightly and Heinemann's Digital Campus, and has contributed to The Journey Is Everything: Teaching Essays That Students Want To Write for People Who Want To Read Them, Open Mic: Riffs on Life Between Cultures in Ten Voices, and Break These Rules: 35 YA Authors on Speaking Up, Standing Out, and Being Yourself. She is a We Need Diverse Books (WNDB) team member and teaches writing at The Loft and Gotham Writers.
She has 10+ years of experience in youth development and literacy education, at community organizations and in New York City schools.

Olugbemisola was the 'new kid' at school many times, in more than one country, and lives with her family in NYC where she writes, makes things, and needs to get more sleep. She loves to visit with readers and writers like you; until then, find her online at olugbemisolabooks.com.

Gwendolyn Hooks is the author of sixteen books for children. She writes both fiction and nonfiction to encourage children to explore their world. As a child, Gwendolyn was forced to explore whenever her Air Force father transferred to another base. "It was hard always being the new girl in class," Gwendolyn remembers about those moves. But she could count on a trip to the library to ease the transition.

Gwendolyn graduated from the University of Missouri-St. Louis with a degree in Secondary Education-Mathematics. She taught in Missouri, Kansas, and Oklahoma. Now she writes from her home in Oklahoma City.
Her recent books are the eight-book series, The Pet Club Stories (Stone Arch Books 2011), Bobby's Big Bear Hunt (Red Chair Press 2010), and The Best Shoes (Bebop Books 2011).

For more about Gwendolyn, visit her at www.GwendolynHooks.com

Crystal Allen
* Crystal was born in a military hospital in Germany because her dad was in the Army.
* She is the youngest of five children.
* Crystal was corn-shucking and multiplication queen of her entire third grade class.
* She is ambidextrous, which means she can write with both hands.
* She wore a wig to school her entire fifth grade year because she hated her hair.
* In high school, Crystal taught everyone in her choir to do the robot and they performed it in a concert.
*Her most recent book is, The Laura Line (Balzar and Bray 2013).

Crystal is married, has two sons, and lives in Sugar Land, Texas.

For more about Crystal, visit her at www.crystalallenbooks.com

Varian Johnson is the author of four novels, including My Life as a Rhombus, which was named to the Texas Library Association Tayshas High School Reading List and the New York Public Library "Stuff for the Teen Age" list, Saving Maddi e, a Bank Street College of Education Best Children's Book and his first middle grade, The Great Greene Heist. He holds an MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults from the Vermont College of Fine Arts, and lives outside of Austin, TX with his family.

Learn more about Varian at http://www.varianjohnson.com/.

Tracey Baptiste, M. Ed is the author of the MG novel THE JUMBIES, which was a New York Public Libraries Staff Pick, and included in the Bank Street Best Books of 2016, among other accolades. She is also the author of the YA novel ANGEL'S GRACE, and several nonfiction books for children. Her latest is THE TOTALLY GROSS HISTORY OF ANCIENT EGYPT. Ms. Baptiste is on the faculty at Lesley University's MFA program in Creative Writing, and works as a freelance editor for various publishing companies as well as running her own editorial company, Fairy Godauthor. You can find Tracey at: www.traceybaptiste.com

Jerry Craft has illustrated and/or written close to two dozen children's books and board games. He has just completed a middle grade novel called: "The Offenders: Saving the World While Serving Detention!" - an action / adventure story co-written with his two teenage sons and is designed to teach kids about the negative effects of bullying. His work has appeared in national publications such as Essence Magazine, Ebony, and two Chicken Soup for the Soul books. Jerry is also the creator of Mama's Boyz, an award-winning comic strip that has been distributed by King Features Syndicate to almost 900 publications since 1995. Jerry has won five African American Literary Awards. You can find Jerry at http://www.jerrycraft.net/.

Paula Chase-Hyman doesn't mind being known as a Jane of all trades, Queen of none. But a single theme has followed throughout her career in communications-keeping her finger on the pulse of teen culture. From starting her own mentoring group at Annapolis Senior High School in '94 to coaching her Green Hornet cheerleaders to Grand Champion (ahem, twice), Chase-Hyman refuses to squash her inner teen diva. Luckily, her long memory for all things young led to a career writing young adult novels.

Paula's Del Rio Bay series, which helped introduce Dafina's YA line, debuted in March 2007.

Visit Paula at http://www.paulachasehyman.com/.

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Don Tate is an award-winning author, and the illustrator of numerous critically acclaimed books for children, including The Cart That Carried Martin, (Charlesbridge); One Hope's Gift, (Penguin); Duke Ellington's Nutcracker Suite (Charlesbridge); She Loved Baseball (HarperCollins); and Ron's Big Mission, (Penguin). He is also the author of It Jes' Happened: When Bill Traylor Started To Draw,...

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De Colores: The Raza Experience in Books for Children

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De Colores: The Raza Experience in Books for Children

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De Colores: The Raza Experience in Books for Children

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From the organization's press release:

The 24th International Latino Book Awards Ceremony showcased the flourishing talent of the fastest-growing group in the U.S., with four ceremonies held on August 19th and 20th at Los Angeles City College. These Awards are by far the largest Latino cultural distinction in the country, honoring 249 winners in 105 categories this year. The grand total of authors and publishers honored over the last two decades now stands at 3,719, proof that books by and about Latinos are in high demand in both English and Spanish. Gold, Silver, and Bronze-place winners in fiction, nonfiction, poetry, children's books, translation, and many more were announced over the two-day event.

Here are the winners-gold, silver, and bronze medals-in the children's books categories. Click on the book covers for more information:

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The Alma Flor Ada Best Latino Focused Children's Picture Book Award - English
GOLD MEDAL Child of the Flower-Song People: Luz Jiménez, Daughter of the Nahua, Gloria Amescua, Illustrated by Duncan Tonatiuh SILVER MEDAL Tía Fortuna's New Home, Ruth Behar, Illustrated by Devon Holzwarth BRONZE MEDAL Bisa's Carnaval, Joana Pastro, Illustrated by Carolina Coroa
The Alma Flor Ada Best Latino Focused Children's Picture Book Award - Spanish
GOLD MEDAL ¡Corre, pequeño Chaski! Una aventura en el camino Inka, Mariana Llanos, Illustrated by Mariana Ruiz Johnson SILVER MEDAL Pura's Cuentos: How Pura Belpré Libraries Reshaped Libraries with Her Stories, Annete Bay Pimentel, Illustrated by Magaly Morales
Best Children's Fiction Picture Book - Bilingual
GOLD MEDAL Let's Be Friends / Seamos Amigos, René Colato Laínez; Illustrated by Nomar Perez SILVER MEDAL Isabel and Her Colores Go to School, Alexandra Alessandri, Illustrated by Courtney Dawson
Best Children's Fiction Picture Book - English
GOLD MEDAL Abuelita and Me, Leonarda Carranza, illustrated by Rafael Mayani SILVER MEDAL Tía Fortuna's New Home, Ruth Behar, Illustrated by Devon Holzwarth BRONZE MEDAL May Your Life Be Deliciosa, Michael Genhart, Illustrated by Loris Lora
Mejor libro ilustrado de ficción para niños
GOLD MEDAL Pitu le Baila al Mar, Gama Valle; Illustrated by Yamel Figueroa SILVER MEDAL La Jirafa que no Cabía en su Cuento, Haydée Zayas Ramos BRONZE MEDAL El monstruo más feo del mundo, Luis Amavisca, Illustrated by Erica Salcedo
Best Children's Nonfiction Picture Book - English
GOLD MEDAL One Whole Me, Dia Mixon, Illustrated by Natalia Jiménez Osorio

SILVER MEDAL In the Spirit of a Dream: 13 Stories of American Immigrants of Color, Aida Salazar, Illustrated by Alina Chau BRONZE MEDAL Alphabet & Affirmations with The Black Unicorn, Sandra Elaine Scott
Best Children's Nonfiction Picture Book - Spanish or Bilingual
GOLD MEDAL Pura's Cuentos: How Pura Belpré Libraries Reshaped Libraries with Her Stories, Annete Bay Pimentel, Illustrated by Magaly Morales
Best Educational Children's Picture Book - Bilingual
GOLD MEDAL Pura's Cuentos: How Pura Belpré Libraries Reshaped Libraries with Her Stories, Annete Bay Pimentel, Illustrated by Magaly Morales SILVER MEDAL Popol Vuh Stories for Children, Denis O'Leary BRONZE MEDAL Lala and the Pond by the Rock / Lala y el Charco de la Piedra, Susana Illera Martínez
Best Educational Children's Picture Book - English
GOLD MEDAL Child of the Flower-Song People: Luz Jiménez, Daughter of the Nahua, Gloria Amescua, Illustrated by Duncan Tonatiuh SILVER MEDAL We Move Together, Kelly Fritsch, Anne McGuire, Illustrated by Eduardo Trejos
Best Educational Children's Picture Book - Spanish
GOLD MEDAL Morderse las uñas, Paula Merlán, Illustrated by Brenda Figueroa
Most Inspirational Children's Picture Book - Bilingual
GOLD MEDAL Pura's Cuentos: How Pura Belpré Libraries Reshaped Libraries with Her Stories, Annete Bay Pimentel, Illustrated by Magaly Morales SILVER MEDAL The Last Butter!y / La última mariposa, Regina Moya & Carmen Tafolla
Most Inspirational Children's Picture Book - English
GOLD MEDAL Courageous Camila: A story about finding your inner warrior, Naibe Reynoso & Giselle Carrillo; Illustrated by María Tuti SILVER MEDAL The Voices of the Trees, Elisa Guerra y Fernando Reimers; Illustrated by Ana RoGu

BRONZE MEDAL Child of the Flower-Song People: Luz Jiménez, Daughter of the Nahua, Gloria Amescua, Illustrated by Duncan Tonatiuh

Most Inspirational Children's Picture Book - Spanish
GOLD MEDAL Tienes un color especial, Lorena Sierco Espino; Mr. Momo, Lantia Publishing Group

SILVER MEDAL Memoria de un abedul, Daniel Cañas, Illustrated by Blanca Millán BRONZE MEDAL Peque y yo, Alicia Acosta, Illustrated by Mercé Galí
Best Learn to Read Book
GOLD MEDAL The Awesome Reading Adventures of Super Sammy and Marvelous Megan, Vanessa Caraveo
Best Youth Latino Focused Chapter Book
GOLD MEDAL Falling Short, Ernesto Cisneros SILVER MEDAL Sofía Acosta Makes a Scene, Emma Otheguy
Best Youth Chapter Fiction Book
GOLD MEDAL Falling Short, Ernesto Cisneros SILVER MEDAL Catalina Incognito, Jennifer Torres BRONZE MEDAL Julia y el mar, Olvido Guzman Pons

Most Inspirational Youth Chapter Book
GOLD MEDAL Barefoot Dreams of Petra Luna, Alda P. Dobbs SILVER MEDAL Efren Divided, Ernesto Cisneros SILVER MEDAL Raulito: The First Latino Governor of Arizona, Roni Capin Rivera-Ashford
Best Young Adult Latino Focused Book
GOLD MEDAL On the Hook, Francisco X. Stork SILVER MEDAL Lifetime Passes, Terry Blas, Illustrated by Claudia Aguirre
Best Young Adult Fiction Book
GOLD MEDAL The Immortal Boy / El Inmortal, Francisco Montaña Ibáñez SILVER MEDAL Encarnación Castro's Journey in the Anza Expedition
1775-1776, Linda Castro Martinez SILVER MEDAL Three, Brenda Nicole Peña BRONZE MEDAL Fat Angie: Homecoming, e.E. Charlton Trujillo
Best Young Adult Fantasy & Adventure - English
GOLD MEDAL The Grimrose Girls, Laura Pohl SILVER MEDAL The Ghost Tracks, Celso Hurtado
Best Young Adult Fantasy & Adventure - Spanish
GOLD MEDAL El Último Dragón: Las espadas del legado, José del Real Antiquera SILVER MEDAL Catarina Freytas y el anillo perdido, Raymond Vollmond BRONZE MEDAL El Mundo del Olvido, Cristian Otárola Jiménez
Best Young Adult Romance Book
GOLD MEDAL Monstrua, NLa Contreras SILVER MEDAL La descendiente, Marie D.
Best Educational Young Adult Book
GOLD MEDAL No te creas todo lo que leas, Didi Whitefalcon, Illustrated by Verónica Rodríguez
SILVER MEDAL Voices of Diversity, Vanessa Caraveo
Most Inspirational Young Adult Book
GOLD MEDAL Harvesting Dreams, Erica Alfaro; Barker & Jules SILVER MEDAL Your Heart, My Sky, Margarita Engle; Simon & Schuster

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Exploring the world of Latinx YA, MG, & children's literature

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* Diverse = Set in a non-Western world or inspired by a non-Western world; or with a main character who is non-white, LGBTQ+, and/or disabled

Congratulations to all the books on the 2015 Rainbow List, "a bibliography of books with significant gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender content, and which are aimed at youth, birth through age 18." Here are the Top 10 picks:

Cinnamon Toast and the End of the World by Janet E. Cameron (Hachette Books Ireland)

Tell Me Again How a Crush Should Feel by Sara Farizan (Algonquin Young Readers) - Read Sara Farizan's interview with DiYA

I'll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson (Dial Books for Young Readers)

Far From You by Tess Sharpe (Hyperion) - Read Tess Sharpe's interview with DiYA

Grasshopper Jungle by Andrew Smith (Dutton Books)

Secret City by Julia Watts (Bella Books)

Sweet Tooth by Tim Anderson, Tim (Lake Union Publishing)

We Are the Youth: Sharing the Stories of LGBT Youth in the United States by Laurel Golio and Diana Scholl (Space-Made)

Not Every Princess by Jeffrey Bone and Lisa Bone (Magination Press)

This Day in June by Gayle E. Pitman, illustrated by Kristyna Litten (Magination Press)

Check out the whole 2015 Rainbow List here.

Congratulations to the diverse1 young adult books honored at the American Library Association's Youth Media Awards on Feb. 2, 2015!

How I Discovered Poetry by Marilyn Nelson, illustrated by Hadley Hooper (Dial Books) - Coretta Scott King (Author) Honor

How It Went Down by Kekla Magoon (Henry Holt and Company) - Coretta Scott King (Author) Honor

When I Was the Greatest by Jason Reynolds (Atheneum Books for Young Readers) - Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe New Talent Author Award

I Lived on Butterfly Hill by Marjorie Agosín, illustrated by Lee White (Atheneum Books for Young Readers) - Pura Belpré (Author) Award Winner

Beyond Magenta: Transgender Teens Speak Out by Susan Kuklin (Candlewick Press) - Stonewall Honor

Girls Like Us by Gail Giles (Candlewick Press) - Schneider Family Book Award Winner

Laughing at My Nightmare by Shane Burcaw (Roaring Brook Press) - YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults (Finalist)

The Port Chicago 50: Disaster, Mutiny, and the Fight for Civil Rights by Steve Sheinkin (Roaring Brook Press) - YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults (Finalist)

Gabi, a Girl in Pieces by Isabel Quintero (Cinco Puntos Press) - William C. Morris Award Winner

I'll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson (Dial Books) - Michael L. Printz Award Winner, Stonewall Honor

Grasshopper Jungle by Andrew Smith (Dutton Books) - Michael L. Printz Honor

This One Summer by Mariko Tamaki, illustrated by Jillian Tamaki (First Second) - Michael L. Printz Honor, Randolph Caldecott Honor

And congratulations to Sharon M. Draper, honored with the Margaret A. Edwards Award for lifetime achievement in writing for young adults!
Check out all the winners of ALA's Youth Media Awards here.

By Malinda Lo
Following up on my post last month, "Gay Without the Gay Angst: 12 Books About Gay/Bi/Queer Boys", here is a list of 10 books about lesbian/bisexual/queer girls without a lot of coming-out angst.

If you're looking for a complete lack of coming-out angst, it's better to stick to the fantasy and science fiction; the realistic titles listed below do address coming out, though with much less angst than in some older titles. Also note that these titles are not all happily-ever-after romances; characters do face challenges and relationships may be full of conflict, but the conflicts and challenges are not primarily due to homophobia.

Admittedly, I found it more difficult to find books about queer girls that don't contain a lot of coming-out angst. This may be because fewer books about queer girls are published in general. All I know is: We need more of them.

Fantasy and Science Fiction

Love in the Time of Global Warming by Francesca Lia Block - now available; also has a companion novel, The Island of Excess Love

Otherbound by Corinne Duyvis - now available

Radiant Days by Elizabeth Hand - now available

Huntress by Malinda Lo - now available; Lo's other books (Ash, Adaptation and Inheritance) also feature queer girls without the gay angst

Afterworlds by Scott Westerfeld - now available

Realistic Fiction

Tell Me Again How a Crush Should Feel by Sara Farizan - now available

No One Needs to Know by Amanda Grace (Flux) - now available

Everything Leads to You by Nina LaCour - now available

Lies My Girlfriend Told Me by Julie Anne Peters - now available; Peters has written many YA books about lesbian/bisexual girls with varying amounts of gay angst

Far From You by Tess Sharpe - now available

Here's a list of 10 diverse contemporary YA books released in the last six months. Now is a great time to check them out!

By Malinda Lo
Last week when I visited a high school in Seattle, a student asked me for recommendations of YA books about gay boys who didn't have to struggle with a lot of coming-out angst. While coming out can certainly be a struggle (mine was!), I completely understand and sympathize with those who want to read books about gay main characters where they can simply be the main characters without facing a ton of homophobia. For a gay reader especially, encountering a large amount of homophobia in a novel might feel realistic and it might make them feel less alone in the world, but it can also feel like an assault on your own identity.

That's why I've put together this list of a dozen YA books in which the main character is a gay, bisexual, or queer boy, but the story is not necessarily about their sexual orientation. Six are fantasy/science fiction, and six are contemporary realistic fiction. If you're looking for a complete lack of coming-out angst, it's better to stick to the fantasy and science fiction; the realistic titles listed below do address coming out, though with much less angst than in some older titles.

Fantasy & Science Fiction

The Bane Chronicles by Cassandra Clare, Maureen Johnson, and Sarah Rees Brennan - Coming Nov. 11, 2014 in hardcover; features Magnus Bane from Cassandra Clare's Shadowhunters series

Proxy and Guardian by Alex London - a science fiction/dystopian duology available now

Masks: Rise of Heroes by Hayden Thorne - a superhero trilogy available now

The Dream Thieves by Maggie Stiefvater - the second book in the Raven Cycle, available now

Witch Eyes by Scott Tracey - an urban fantasy trilogy available now

Coda by Emma Trevayne - available now; has a companion novel, Chorus

Realistic Fiction

One Man Guy by Michael Barakiva - now available

Openly Straight by Bill Konigsberg - now available

Two Boys Kissing by David Levithan - now available; Levithan's Boy Meets Boy is also a classic of the no-gay-angst type

M or F? by Lisa Papademetriou and Chris Tebbetts - now available

Boyfriends With Girlfriends by Alex Sanchez - now available; Sanchez's Rainbow Boys trilogy begins with some coming-out issues, but subsequent books move past that aspect of being gay

Fan Art by Sarah Tregay - now available

Thanks to everyone on Twitter who helped me out with recommendations! I'll post a similar list about lesbian, bisexual, and queer teen girls in the near future.

By Elsa Marston
Abdel-Fattah, Randa. Where the Streets Had a Name (Scholastic 2010). Palestine, MG/YA. On a secret mission of mercy, a girl makes her way-strictly forbidden without permission from Israeli authorities-from her village into Jerusalem. [Also see this author's books about Arab immigrants in Australia: Does My Head Look Big in This? and Ten things I Hate About Me. Both have appealing teen voice.]

Al-Maria, Sophia. The Girl Who Fell to Earth (Harper Perennial 2012). Arabian Peninsula and Egypt, YA. The daughter of a mixed marriage spends time with her father's family in a Gulf State, tries to reconcile her two radically different heritages.

Barakat, Ibtisam. Tasting the Sky: A Palestinian Childhood (Kroupa/Farrar Straus Giroux 2007). Palestine, MG/YA. Memoir of a young girl set in a time of war and displacement, but revealing solid family experience.

Carmi, Daniella. Samir and Yonatan (Levine/Scholastic 2000). Israel/Palestinians, MG/YA. A Palestinian boy being treated in an Israeli hospital relates to the children and medical staff.

Carter, Anne Laurel. The Shepherd's Granddaughter (Groundwood 2008). Palestine, MG/YA. In a rural village under attack from a nearby Israeli settlement, a young teenaged girl starts to broaden her horizons.

Clinton, Cathryn. A Stone in My Hand (Candlewick 2002). Palestine, MG/YA. During an outbreak of violence, a young girl in Gaza copes with loss: her father's death and her brother's participation in the insurrection.

Laird, Elizabeth. A Little Piece of Ground (Haymarket 2006; originally Macmillan UK 2003). Palestine, MG/YA. A boy defies Israeli-imposed curfew in his efforts to claim a place to play soccer.

Nye, Naomi Shihab. Habibi (Simon & Schuster 1997). Palestine, MG/YA. An Arab-American girl visits her father's natal village in Palestine, under occupation, and absorbs experiences both exhilarating and distressing.

Marsden, Carolyn. The White Zone (CarolRhoda 2012). Iraq, MG. Two boy cousins cope with the sectarian strife that separates them during the fighting in Baghdad.

Marston, Elsa. Santa Claus in Baghdad and Other Stories About Teens in the Arab World (Indiana University Press 2008). Several countries, MG/YA. Young teens in eight contrasting Arab societies face universal challenges of adolescence; the most adult story in subject matter is "Honor" (Jordan).

Perera, Anna. The Glass Collector (Whitman 2011). Egypt, YA. Valuable chiefly because of its setting in the "trash-collectors community" in Cairo.

With an M.A. in international affairs from Harvard University in hand, Elsa Marston attended the American University of Beirut on a Rotary Foundation Fellowship. Sojourns in different countries, especially Lebanon, Egypt, and Tunisia, have helped inspire Elsa'a work as a children's/YA author and specialist in literature about the region. Her most recent books are a YA biography of a remarkable Arab hero, The Compassionate Warrior: Abd el-Kader of Algeria (Wisdom Tales 2013), and Santa Claus in Baghdad and Other Stories About Teens in the Arab World (Indiana University Press, 2008), a collection of stories set in different Arab societies, focusing on growing-up experiences that young Americans can relate to. A picture book about post-civil war Lebanon, The Olive Tree, is forthcoming in 2014 . Her website is www.elsamarston.com.

In honor of Pride month, here are 10 YA books about contemporary LGBT experiences just published this year. If you haven't had a chance to check them out yet, now's a great time!

Within the last few weeks, the , and New York Times, Entertainment Weekly School Library Journal CNN have all published articles examining the lack of diversity in children's and young adult literature - and next month, plans to publish an entire issue devoted to diversity. While all this mainstream interest in diversity is to be applauded for bringing more people into the ongoing conversation about diversity, they still largely fail to tackle the problem of how we can change the status quo.

We at Diversity in YA obviously don't have all the answers, and we aren't the first people to talk about these issues. This conversation has been going on for decades. What we do have are ideas for how you can change the status quo right now. If you're an ordinary reader, you don't have to wait to show your support for books that show the world as it is. Here are five ways you can help make positive change right now:

1. Look for diversity.

Make a conscious effort to seek out books to read that feature characters of color, LGBT characters, and/or disabled characters. They may not be front-and-center at your local Barnes & Noble; you may have to look around a bit or go online to find them.

2. Support diversity.

Support the diverse books that are published today by buying them, by checking them out at your library, or by requesting that your library buy them.

3. Recommend diversity.

If you use Goodreads, Facebook, social media, or have a blog, talk up the books you love that happen to have diverse characters. Tell your friends! Word of mouth is still key in bringing awareness to books. And remember: You don't need to recommend them solely for their diversity - they're great books to enjoy, plain and simple.

4. Talk up diversity.

When discussions around diversity in literature occur online, join in the conversation if you can to express that you do want more diverse books to read and that the issue is important to you.

5. Don't give up.

There will always be people who dismiss "diversity" as meaningless. They are the reason we must keep fighting for representation. We're all in this together.

Want a list of diverse YA books you can get started reading right now? Here are a dozen YA books of all kinds (contemporary, fantasy, sci-fi, mystery - something for everyone!) that happen to have characters of color, LGBT characters, and/or disabled characters. (Descriptions are from WorldCat.)

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Continue reading Want More Diversity in Your YA? Here's How You Can Help

Book Lists Dori Jones Yang, elizabeth wein, Historical Fiction, Jane Eagland, Kay Honeyman, Margarita Engle, Meghan Nuttall Sayres, Padma Venkatraman, Sonia Manzano, Tanita S. Davis, Tonya Cherie Hegamin

In honor of Women's History Month, here are 10 diverse young adult historical novels about girls. Descriptions are from Worldcat.

Mare's War by Tanita S. Davis (Alfred A. Knopf)

Teens Octavia and Tali learn about strength, independence, and courage when they are forced to take a car trip with their grandmother, who tells about growing up Black in 1940s Alabama and serving in Europe during World War II as a member of the Women's Army Corps.

Wildthorn by Jane Eagland (Houghton Mifflin)

Seventeen-year-old Louisa Cosgrove is locked away in the Wildthorn Hall mental institution, where she is stripped of her identity and left to wonder who has tried to destroy her life.

The Lightning Dreamer: Cuba's Greatest Abolitionist by Margarita Engle (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)

In free verse, evokes the voice of Gertrudis Gomez de Avellaneda, a book-loving writer, feminist, and abolitionist who courageously fought injustice in nineteenth-century Cuba. Includes historical notes, excerpts from her writings, biographical information, and source notes.

Willow by Tonya Cherie Hegamin (Candlewick Press)

In 1848 Willow, a fifteen-year-old educated slave girl, faces an inconceivable choice - between bondage and freedom, family and love - as free born, seventeen-year-old Cato, a black man, takes it upon himself to sneak as many fugitive slaves to freedom as he can on the Mason-Dixon Line.

The Fire Horse Girl by Kay Honeyman (Arthur A. Levine Books)

When Jade Moon, born in the unlucky year of the Fire Horse, and her father immigrate to America in 1923 and are detained at Angel Island Immigration Station, Jade Moon is determined to find a way through and prove that she is not cursed.

The Revolution of Evelyn Serrano by Sonia Manzano (Scholastic)

It is 1969 in Spanish Harlem, and fourteen-year-old Evelyn Serrano is trying hard to break free from her conservative Puerto Rican surroundings, but when her activist grandmother comes to stay and the neighborhood protests start, things get a lot more complicated-and dangerous.

Anahita's Woven Riddle by Meghan Nuttall Sayres (Amulet)

In Iran, more than 100 years ago, a young girl with three suitors gets permission from her father and a holy man to weave into her wedding rug a riddle to be solved by her future husband, which will ensure that he has wit to match hers.

Climbing the Stairs by Padma Venkatraman (Penguin)

In India, in 1941, when her father becomes brain-damaged in a non-violent protest march, fifteen-year-old Vidya and her family are forced to move in with her father's extended family and become accustomed to a totally different way of life.

Rose Under Fire by Elizabeth Wein (Hyperion)

When young American pilot Rose Justice is captured by Nazis and sent to Ravensbrück, the notorious women's concentration camp, she finds hope in the impossible through the loyalty, bravery, and friendship of her fellow prisoners.

Daughter of Xanadu by Dori Jones Yang (Delacorte)

Emmajin, the sixteen-year-old eldest granddaughter of Khublai Khan, becomes a warrior and falls in love with explorer Marco Polo in thirteenth-century China.

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Diverse = Set in a non-Western world or inspired by a non-Western world; or with a main character who is non-white, LGBTQ+, and/or disabled Congratulations to all the books on the 2015 Rainbow List , "a bibliography of books with significant gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender content, and which are aimed at youth, birth through age 18."

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Rich in Color - Reading & Reviewing Diverse YA Books

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blackgirlmagic #Common Core #groupdiscussion #WeNeedDiverseBooks Anthology asian ya author interview authors banned books week blacklivesmatter black love book lists book reviews contemporary debut author diverse worlds diversity evaluating literature fantasy group discussion horror julie kagawa lgbtq lgbtqia new releases ownvoices queer comics queer ya racism recommendation: borrow it someday recommendation: get it now recommendation: get it soon recommendation: just skip it recruiting retelling retellings reviews romance summer reads superhero tu books Women's History Month year in review Zetta Elliott Zettasbooks

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Disability in Kidlit - Reviews, articles, and more about the portrayal of disabilities in children's fiction

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Despite some reservations, our reviewer would recommend this contemporary novel about young Bat - and the reviewer's ten-year-old goddaughter agrees.

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Alice had her whole summer planned. Non-stop all-you-can-eat buffets while marathoning her favorite TV show. The only thing missing from her plan? Her girlfriend (who ended things when Alice told her she's asexual). Alice is done with dating-no thank you, do not pass go, stick a fork in her, done. But when Alice meets Takumi and she can't stop thinking about him or the rom com-grade romance feels she did not ask for, her blissful summer takes an unexpected turn.

Claire Kann is the author of the forthcoming novel Let's Talk About Love, which comes out January 23, 2018.

Let's Talk About Love will be published through Swoon Reads, an imprint of Macmillan Children's Publishing Group that invites writers to submit YA manuscript directly to its site and allows readers to have a say in what gets published. Writers chosen for publication are offered a traditional publishing contract.

Here's Claire in conversation with her editor, Kat Brzozowski.
Kat asks Claire... What inspired you to write Let's Talk About Love Alice has such a strong voice in this novel. How did you develop Alice's character? ?
"Write the kind of book you want to read."

At any given time, I have several characters and storylines running through my mind. Alice popped into my head fully formed. Initially, she had zero chill, tended to overreact, was always laughing and screeching her joy, and cried at the drop of a hat-a lively, raw, and emotionally driven character.
Alice identifies as asexual. How did this help shape her character?
It took a lot of time, finessing, and cut words to whittle her personality down to get to the core of who Alice was. In the first draft, I wrote LTAL in first person, but upon editing, I realized Alice was just too chaotic to steer the narrative, so I switched to third person in efforts to give the story the structure it needed-Alice told me what happened, I wrote it down.
What made you submit your novel to Swoon Reads? How did the feedback from readers on Swoon Reads help guide your writing process?
However, I still wanted her to be able to shine. I would write a section and Alice would throw out a million asides-I ended up incorporating her exact words into the book using parenthesis.
Do you have any advice for aspiring writers, particularly for those writing books with LGBTIA+ characters? Claire asks Kat... When I found out you were going to edit LTAL, I nearly fainted because of your author list. How do you approach working with such an eclectic and diverse group of authors?
When Alice came to me, she had already known she was biromantic asexual but didn't know those specific words existed. I decided to set the story after that tumultuous period of discovery and self-acceptance because it definitely shaped how she interacted with the people she was romantically interested in. Alice, the hopeless romantic that she is, was so insistent on focusing on a her future HEA that it became the one thing she wanted most, which I believe is always the most compelling story to tell.
Does your editing process change depending on the book you're working on or do you employ a one-size fits all approach?
Pre-selection, the majority of the feedback was open, positive, and constructive. Post-selection, the original manuscript had remained up on the site for a limited time, and there was an influx of new reviews that were decidedly less positive-some were flat-out negative, invalidating, and angry. I won't lie: sifting through those negative reviews was an emotionally brutal process and hurt me both as a writer and as a person more than I thought it would. But I still had time to correct my mistakes. It would have been irresponsible of me to ignore what they had to say. I became determined to find a common root for the issues pointed out and apply those changes during edits.
Does the feedback from Swoon Readers affect how you approach an edit letter?
*blushes* No matter what kind of book I'm working on, whether it's magical realism, LGTBQIA+ contemporary, a mystery, or a genre book, I'm always drawn to a few key things - a strong sense of voice, fully developed characters, and great dialogue. I love working on so many different genres because my editing workload always feels totally fresh, and I learn new things from every author on my list.
Is Swoon Reads open to using sensitivity readers during the editing process if needed? How do you approach potentially incorporating the feedback?
It definitely changes based on the book I'm working on! Some books need more editorial help when it comes to big picture changes - restructuring the plot, clarifying character motivations, etc. Some books have all of the big stuff worked out but need time finessing the writing on the sentence level - making the dialogue feel natural, letting the voice shine through. I try to start with big picture notes and work towards the smaller notes as we progress, because it doesn't make a lot of sense to edit lines that are going to be cut later when we chop scenes away! I love to line edit, though, so I can't help making line notes here and there, even in early drafts.
The colors for the final LTAL cover were purposefully chosen to reflect the asexual flag. As an editor, do you have any part in deciding which elements of representation appear on the covers?
Definitely! Before I start editing a Swoon Reads book, I look at all of the comments from our trusty readers, and I often incorporate their feedback into my editorial letter. It's especially useful when I see the same comment over and over; that means there's a big glaring thing that's hanging up readers, and that's what the author and I should focus on first. It's wonderful to have real readers offer feedback on a novel before it's even published!

Definitely! We are always open to using sensitivity readers on our novels. The process of incorporating feedback from these readers starts with sharing their feedback with the author and talking about what changes should be made to the text. The author has to feel comfortable with the final product, of course, so we always discuss any changes that should be made first and then work together to make these changes. We always appreciate sensitivity reads because they help draw our attention to issues that the editor and the author aren't always aware of.

I swoon hard for the Let's Talk About Love cover! As an editor, I offer suggestions about what the cover should look like and provide background info like character descriptions, setting descriptions, and more, but the designer has a lot of freedom to play around, and the designers often come up with ideas I never would have thought of! What's so great about Swoon Reads is that our users vote on the cover direction they want, and we were so excited they chose this beautiful cover for your book.

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Alice had her whole summer planned. Non-stop all-you-can-eat buffets while marathoning her favorite TV show. The only thing missing from her plan? Her girlfriend (who ended things when Alice told her she's asexual). Alice is done with dating-no thank you, do not pass go, stick a fork in her, done.

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I'm Here. I'm Queer. What the Hell Do I Read?

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I'm Here. I'm Queer. What the Hell Do I Read?

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I'm Here. I'm Queer. What the Hell do I read?

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Gay Teen Books, Culture and Politics ...and More! (Yes, "Gay Teen" includes Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, Questioning, Queer, and Gender Non-Conforming Teens!)

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A note about the following: I wrote this post several months ago. It was originally scheduled to publish Thursday March 12; we decided not to post it then because the night before, COVID-19 news swept the nation and all attention was focused there.

I know that some of our readers, like me, have time and mental space to read this right now; some do not. Our email and DMs are open; please get in touch if there is any support we can provide, and take care.

On January 31, we published a Links Roundup post. While we published it under the group account, I (Allie) organized and posted it, so I'm primarily responsible for the mistakes therein-namely, that in promoting Lee and Low's writeup of the 2019 Diversity Baseline Survey, I failed to name and credit Dr. Laura M. Jiménez, as well as Betsy Beckert, as co-authors of the survey. My mistake was part of a pattern in this specific instance ( the Guardian also failed to credit Dr. Jiménez and Ms. Beckert for their work on this survey), but it is also part of a larger pattern of White erasure of BIPOC people and work. So with a healthy dose of humility that comes with recognizing myself as a big part of the problem, and with my (and our) sincere apologies to Dr. Jiménez and Ms. Beckert, that pattern of erasure is the subject of this post.

With full credit to the People's Institute for Survival and Beyond, we here at Reading While White define racism as "Race-based prejudice coupled with access to systemic, structural power." It is impossible to exist in the world without having internalized race-based prejudice, and Whiteness necessarily confers a privileged relationship to systemic and structural power upon White people. Therefore, under this definition, all White people are racist. And all White people working on anti-racist activism necessarily bring their racism into their anti-racist work.

It is an inescapable truth that I will bring my own Whiteness and my own racism into anti-racist spaces, and that I will often reproduce racism in those spaces. I can always work to do better, but part of doing better is accepting and sitting with the inherent contradiction of my being in these spaces at all, trying to do anti-racist work while not denying the fact that I am racist.

In a study on how White activists contribute to severe burnout among BIPOC activists, Paul C. Gorski and Noura Erakat identified patterns of White activists "undermining or invalidating the racial justice work of activists of color" and "taking credit for participants' racial justice work and ideas" as major contributors to BIPOC burnout (among others). According to Gorski and Erakat, "white activists derived benefits from their involvement in racial justice activism at the expense of activists of color who, in turn, were silenced, undermined, disrespected, and eventually burned out."

Specifically, in Gorski's and Erakat's study, BIPOC activists reported that White activists:

"appropriate antiracist organizations by usurping power from activists of color"

"Need... the spotlight, [which] led some to exploit activists of color either to acquire benefits-leadership positions or speaking invitations, for example-or to win validation from activists of color."

"take credit for ideas they previously dismissed from [BIPOC activists]"

"accept benefits, such as credit and recognition, for ideas and work produced by activists of color." (One interviewee offered, as an example, White Academics "who just want to get their name published with someone who is recognized for doing racial justice.")

"take the work developed by marginalized people and 'put their name on it.' [One interviewee] explained, 'I have white racial justice workers who ... even record me or photograph something I post and use it as if it's theirs, without giving me credit ... as they coopt it and reappropriate it in a way that is dangerous.'"

BIPOC activists in Gorski's and Erakat's study described these White-rooted, within-community conditions as more intense and potent than external causes of burnout: "The racism that propelled participants into racial justice movements was reproduced within those movements. For many participants, this was a particularly disappointing and stress-inducing condition because they had entered movements hoping for a reprieve from the racism with which they coped outside their movements...." It stands to reason that White activists (including us at RWW) have done as much to undermine the anti-racist movement as any external force, and we (White people, including us at RWW) inevitably continue to do so.
There are different levels of White erasure of BIPOC work, from just ignoring it to actively appropriating it. Failing to acknowledge or credit BIPOC people for their work and ideas also erases their very existence and presence in activist spaces, a particularly noxious form of racism.

Big names in the White Anti-racist movement necessarily play a role in this problem. Tim Wise has been rightly criticised for how he dominates, profits from, and moves in general through anti-racist spaces; Leslie Mac, creator of the Ferguson Response Network and much more, wrote: "From Tim Wise to Dixon White - our pain is used for profit. And repeating concepts created by Black folks thru a white lens will always sell." While I myself have learned deeply from, and am grateful for, the work of White Fragility author Robin DiAngelo, I recognize that she also benefits from White privilege within the anti-racist movement; the BIPOC people with whom she's collaborated don't have nearly the same level of national name-recognition, at least among White people (I saw Dr. DiAngelo present at a conference with Darlene Flynn in 2017; both were excellent, and I've been bothered ever since that Robin DiAngelo is a household name among White activists and Flynn is not).

We here at Reading While White fall into this category as well. Although we do not have the same level of mainstream attention nationally as Wise or DiAngelo, we do have a disproportionate degree of clout within the fields of librarianship and children's literature, given that some of our BIPOC colleagues have done this work for more than twenty years (and we turn five this Fall). Ironically, given how I subsequently erased her work, Dr. Laura Jiménez pointed this out to me when I interviewed her three years ago:

The one thing that frustrates me the most--and I'm glad that Reading While White is doing what it does--is that if I say something about a book, if Debbie or Edi says something, we're all told that we're not giving the author a chance. That they tried. We are not believed. If you look at the traffic RWW get vs the traffic I get or Edi gets, even though we've been doing this for longer, you get more, and the only difference is that you're White. To be honest, part of me resents that. And, I am glad that there are people willing to amplify our voices. If I write something, and you pick it up, that means so many more people will be willing to hear it. And that is paramount to my work. You get a lot of crap, the same criticism, but at the end of the day, you are heard and you are believed. Without White voices, our message can't be heard. We are not believed. It's good that your team realizes it.

I am glad that Dr. Jiménez was honest here, although she was much more generous with us than we deserve, i.e., we do NOT get the same crap; what we get is much smaller, and benign by comparison. I imagine there are many BIPOC people within the children's literature field who feel similarly-or more strongly-and for good, valid reasons aren't inclined to tell us that they feel that way (see: Gorski's and Erakat's study about burnout above).

You've probably heard that Black people-especially women-need to work "twice as hard for half as much" (mainstream White America can thank Scandal for bringing that maxim into our consciousness). Think about what this means for us as White people: We work half as hard, for twice as much.

How does this show up in children's literature? For one, the bar to be published is infinitely higher for BIPOC creators; and even if you are published, the level of attention and spotlight from the vast majority of bookstores and libraries is disproportionately higher for White creators. While perusing my local Barnes & Noble the other night, I was angered by the number of mediocre books by White people, mostly men, prominently on display in the children's section. There were several that I'd hazard would never have been published, let alone given the best display space, had a Black woman submitted the same text. This itself is a form of erasure-our insistence upon highlighting the same White men, over and over, causes and allows them to take up space that should belong to BIPOC creators, and by extension, BIPOC readers.

SCBWI Minnesota recently quite literally erased-that is, deleted-the work of Dr. Sarah Park Dahlen when she pointed out that the image they'd set as their banner was a stereotypical, racist image (link included with permission). They also erased the voices of many people who'd commented in agreement with Dr. Dahlen. Deletion of harmful posts is a common form of White erasure; in one fell swoop, the original poster can erase, rather than take ownership of, their mistakes, and can also erase the voices of any BIPOC critiquing racism. In this case, SCBWI Minnesota also decided not to clarify who was responsible for the deletions (link included with permission), thereby erasing their responsibility for that act of erasure and diffusing the blame for this act of racism. Such deletions gaslight the targets of racism (which compounds the initial racism). As Dr. Ebony Elizabeth Thomas noted in a thread about patterns of White erasure she noticed last year, "oppression justifies its violence and power by arguing that the oppressed's receipts are invalid" (quote included with permission).

(A point of clarification here: SCBWI Minnesota later posted screenshots of the deleted content. Another point of clarification: Screenshots that are not transcribed are not accessible to those who use screen readers.)

Erasure also shows up in children's literature when White creators steal ideas from creators of color and present them as their own. This ranges from the constant entitlement White authors feel to tell BIPOC stories to outright theft and plagiarism. (If you haven't read Jacqueline Woodson's Who Can Tell My Story in a while, pause and re-read it now, and also make time for a re-read of Debbie Reese's An oft-posed question: "Who can tell your stories?"-and actually, also read Maya Gonzalez' My Story, Your Story, Their Story, Who Gets To Tell It before you read any more of my work). You may also have read David Bowles' recent, expert pieces on the "harmful, appropriating, inaccurate, trauma-porn melodrama" that is Jeanine Cummins' American Dirt, or Maya Gonzalez' careful documentation of how White authors Brook Pessin-Whedbee and Kelly Storck, as well as their publishers (Jessica Kingsley Publishers and Instant Help Books/imprint of New Harbinger Publications, Inc.) plagiarized her work. Recently, Tangerine Jones wrote about how authors Katherine Alford and Kathy Gunst, plus their publisher Simon and Schuster, coopted and profit from her work-and the White aggression Alford and Gunst brought against her. White plundering of Native stories and cultural content for profit also echoes the history of colonial invasion. As Professor Rebecca Tsosie says:

Indigenous peoples have property interests, even if they don't fall within the narrow definitions of Western law. This was a problem in the sixteenth century when the Doctrine of Discovery was applied as an international doctrine to validate the interests of European sovereigns in claiming property in the lands that were described as the "New World." They said that indigenous peoples don't really have property rights, they just kind of roam around on the land, and so it's okay for Europeans to go and appropriate the land and say that they have title. Now that's what we don't want to do with intellectual property rights in the modern era... [P]eople can go and basically steal indigenous songs and stories, and then they can copyright them... the harm's not merely economic, but it can be a cultural form of harm that could be very devastating.

(Many thanks to Dr. Debbie Reese for answering my questions on this subject, and for sending me that link.) All of the above are examples of the different forms that White appropriation and erasure of BIPOC work can take in the world of literature.

[CONTENT WARNING FOR THIS PARAGRAPH - discusses police killings of Black people]

But perhaps the most dangerous, destructive aspect of this erasure is the flipside. If White people leap to take credit and rewards for BIPOC work and ideas-and if we make those White names household staples, while erasing the names and existence of robbed BIPOC people-we also do the reverse, when it comes to blaming BIPOC people for their own murders while simultaneously erasing the White-owned guilt for those murders. I'm talking to White readers, now. You likely can name a slew of Black people murdered by police: Michael Brown. Eric Garner. Tamir Rice. Philando Castile. Alton Sterling. How many of their killers can you name, off the top of your head? They are: Darren Wilson. Daniel Pantaleo. Timothy Loehmann. Jeronimo Yanez. Howie Lake. Blane Salamoni. Yes, I had to look up most of those. No, they aren't all White, but their lack of mainstream name recognition still protects a White-dominant police force. None were held legally responsible for killing the above human beings. Why were their victims put on trial, their private lives plundered and exposed, by a White-dominant media and public desperate to find a reason to blame them for their own murders? Why have we (White people) done our best to malign their names and their legacies, exonerate their killers', and erase those of women and nonbinary BIPCOC victims? In the interest of Saying Her Name: Meagan Hockaday. Tanisha Anderson. Mya Hall. Alexia Christian. There are too many more. We should know them.

All of the credit for anti-racist gains, none of the blame for racism... this is still the dominant narrative in every sector of the White community, from open bigots with sheets and torches to the wokest of the woke.

At the White Privilege Conference in 2017, Darlene Flynn and Robin DiAngelo said that "getting educated just makes White folks better racists." BIPOC activists have raised concerns about White anti-racist activism for a long time; I recently re-read the famous excerpt from The Autiobiography of Malcolm X in which he advises "sincere" White people to "...find all other white people they can who feel as they do-and let them form their own all-white groups, to work trying to convert other white people who are thinking and acting so racist." This passage, among many other things, helped inform our thinking when we first launched Reading While White. I'd remembered the above words perfectly, but had conveniently managed to forget the following:

I have these very deep feelings that white people who want to join black organizations are really just taking the escapist way to salve their consciences. By visibly hovering near us, they are 'proving' that they are 'with us' ... generally whites' very presence subtly renders the black organization automatically less effective... I know that every time that whites join a black organization, you watch, pretty soon... a black may be up front with a title, but the whites, because of their money, are the real controllers.

What can we White people do, to be and do better? It's possible to get stuck in guilt, when we reflect on how we can aid and abet racism despite our best intentions. It's also tempting, while reflecting on this, to outright disengage from anti-racist efforts; and at times, we White people do need to step back, since our very presence can (as Malcolm X reminds us) automatically render BIPOC-led efforts less effective. And we should definitely remove ourselves when we're told that we're actively harming BIPOC activists.

White activists won't, however, help matters by completely and permanently disengaging from the movement. We also won't help by self-flagellating-especially publicly, which puts a lot of pressure on the injured people to provide forgiveness and absolution. There is no perfect science to knowing when to step up and step back, but we have a responsibility to keep trying to show up when it's helpful to the movement, and to step back when it's not.

The study I cited above from Gorski and Erakat suggests that White activists can improve by "policing one another around concerns related to credit- and spotlight-grabbing behaviors (such as coopting the ideas of activists of color) so activists of color do not need to expend energy doing so." We must hold each other accountable to this, and we must fight the kneejerk defensiveness that so often comes when anyone-fellow White people included-try to hold us accountable. Inviting others to give us direct feedback (and sharing how they can do that easily) is a good first step here, and in that spirit, please always feel free to email us, readingwhilewhite@gmail.com. We must remember, also, that asking fellow White people to hold us accountable should not be an excuse to ignore or dismiss BIPOC people when they do choose to expend energy to hold us accountable, feedback to which we are not entitled but for which we should be grateful.

We can also correct ourselves and each other when we start to subtly usurp and take control of BIPOC-led organizations, as Malcolm X warns is our default. Making finances, funding, and decision-making processes in organizations transparent, and making transparency the norm, can help; we also must listen and act when BIPOC people voice concerns about White leadership or processes. Patterns of BIPOC leaving organizations are almost always a signal that something is rotten in the White culture of that organization, and when we notice such patterns, we must self-examine and ask for help and education from our White friends and community. And above all, when we're made aware that we're impeding anti-racist efforts, we must remove ourselves, and commit to change and accountability, before we continue to inflict harm on BIPOC activists and weaken the movement overall.

Gorski and Erakat also advise White activists to "prioritize movement goals over their needs for recognition and validation." Putting this into practice is easier said than done. Many White people are drawn to anti-racist work entirely for ego- or profit-based reasons; maybe a few are drawn to the work for entirely pure reasons and don't care about recognition at all. But most of us fall somewhere in between (I include myself in that group). I need to learn, and practice, checking my ego (and letting others check my ego). We White people need to help each other actually do that work of prioritizing movement goals over egos-and this involves having very clear goals, as well as people we trust to hold us accountable.
(A quick N.B.: This language-"prioritize movement goals over your need for recognition and validation"-should never be used as an excuse to give men credit for the work of women and nonbinary people, to give cisgender or heterosexual people credit for LGBTQIA+ work, to give nondisabled people credit for disabled work, or to justify oppression of any other intersecting identity.)

We must also work on doing the flipside of all this. In addition to giving full credit to BIPOC people for BIPOC ideas and work, we need to work to take responsibility for White-owned and White-originated mistakes, harm, and damage. This means making apologies that don't ring hollow, taking action to correct the damage we've done, and working to prevent similar mistakes in the future. This means we openly and eagerly educate fellow White people about our own mistakes, rather than covering them up from each other in an effort to be the best White person in the group.

Dr. Jiménez told us, three years ago, that one of the most useful things we can do at Reading While White is to pass the mic. We have to do a better job of passing that mic, and talk internally often about how we can do better (we're always open to criticism and suggestions on this subject, as well). Our White readers can also play a role in this, by making sure that you hear what our BIPOC colleagues have to say when we do pass the mic. Read our kindred spirits, and read them before you read us. We make it a point to link to BIPOC articles, essays, and blog posts as often as we can-click through those and read them. If it means you have to stop reading us so you can read them, please read them. Like them more than you like us on social media. Amplify them more than you amplify us. And when they call upon you to take action, listen to them. Don't wait for us to say "don't promote books with anthropomorphic monkeys"-believe Edi Campbell when she says it herself.

I'm sorry to Dr. Jiménez-I shouldn't have erased your work. All of us at RWW are grateful that Dr. Jiménez encouraged us to acknowledge and examine that act; it's given us a chance to reflect and learn. And in the spirit of this work, we hope that these reflections are useful to you, too.

-Allie Jane Bruce

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A note about the following: I wrote this post several months ago. It was originally scheduled to publish Thursday March 12; we decided not to post it then because the night before, COVID-19 news swept the nation and all attention was focused there.

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Re-Vamping Summer Reading, Part Three: Super-Action Play Packs
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It is the eternal question of youth services in a public library. What the heck do we do about the darn summer reading prizes? How do we stop kids from cheating? WHY are we even giving prizes? Why do we have so much plastic crap? How can we get kids interested in the program without incentives? How do we stop parents from cheating?

Yes, if you do youth services in a public library of any size, you have asked yourself these questions over and over. And I truly believe there is no one answer. More than that: I truly believe that you can keep trying and finding new answers and tweaking it. You are NOT locked into "that's what we've always done" or "people will hate the change!" Will it be hard at first? Will there be bumps? Will you get a few complaints? Sure - maybe. But for one: that's no reason not to make a change. For another, believe me, for the most part people are just happy to have a fun, free program to participate in with their kids and kids LOVE new stuff.

We've been making tweaks over the past few years as I strove to move our program away from the curse of CHEAP PLASTIC CRAP that instantly breaks, costs too much money, and has never motivated a single kid to read one single thing. Because of this, I like to think about our program as a work in progress. This has really helped ease my anxiety about things: we can try things out! We can learn! We can change!

We still use paper logs. I think this needs to be addressed up front. We just don't have a high enough population or summer participation to warrant the cost right now of switching over to software that keeps logs and tracking online. I hope that in years to come, this software will become cheaper (and, errr, a little easier to use) and we can switch over, but for now we're still using paper tracking.

In 2015 we made our most radical overall yet: changing the entire program to incorporate MORE than just reading. I had been wanting to make this move for some time and I finally realized it was time to take the jump. I want to thank all the librarians who have shared their MORE THAN READING programs, not only did it give me an outline of what I wanted, it gave me the courage to make the change. You should start with their amazing, wonderful blogs, as I used them as inspiration'templates.

Summer LIBRARY Club from Library Bonaza

Summer Prizes - Goodbye! from Tiny Tips for Library Fun

Summer Reading Booklets from Hafuboti

I loved all the elements I saw there (and in other places) but I realized I had two major problems that had kept me from trying to make these shifts. I think if you live in a smaller town, you might have similar problems.

We don't have anything like a minor league baseball team or a water park or anything I have seen as a giant "experience" incentive in other programs.

My library is part of the county government and, as of now, we've run into many bureaucracy problems about getting local coupons and discounts. There's just SO MUCH red tape about it. Sigh. And many of these programs use these coupon books as a key component and incentive.

But then I realized instead of thinking about the things we DIDN'T have to build a new program based on experiences and not just checking off "I read ____ minutes" boxes, I should look at what we DID have and build around that.

We have a generous Friends organization! So I bought a lot of cool, new, high interest books from Scholastic FACE to give away as prizes - and we set up one of our program rooms as a bookstore for the kids. (Sadly, our town doesn't have a bookstore anymore, so kids might not always get the chance to have the delight of browsing a bookstore. But one fun thing we could do was create a similar experience.

We have the Aquatic Center - and they not only part of the county but part of our same division. They love to cooperate with us by giving us children's passes as a way to encourage whole families or groups to come.

I figured I could use those to create something that would work for our library and our community. The next step was setting some goals for what I wanted to new program to achieve and WHY. I think that's very important before you begin ANY program revamp. It gives you focus and drive.

Our NEW summer goals:

Make the program include more than just reading - but keep reading a key element.

Add in something for actually showing up to the library. We want to get people in doors and at programs - so why not have the program reflect that?

Have it easy to adjust to individual needs, i.e. make it as customizable as possible.

To me, one thing that would address all of these goals was to ADD LEVELS . That had elements of gamifcation on a level I liked. In this new configuration, patrons could choose to participate as they wanted. They could try to finish ALL the levels to earn a trip to our "bookstore" and pick out a free book (they also got a plastic bookbag and some scented bookmarks) or they could just finish one level and get the prize for that level.

At this point, two great things happened - we had Rebecca's amazing superhero art to use and we had awesome in-house design skills. Kate is a former full-time librarian at our library in both circulation and reference but she went to on-call/substitute status when she had her baby. She's AMAZING at design. (you can find her Teachers Pay Teachers page here - she's just launching so you'll want to follow her NOW.) She took all of my half-formed ideas and created something totally cool. Why don't we take a look??!

Worth noting:

Instead of NUMBERING the goals (W hat order do we do these in? Can I start on #3 before I finish #2??) we named them after fictional superhero/ine locations. (and heck yeah we used Themyscira, the island Wonder Woman is from.)

For many years our paper logs were 8 x 11.5 sheets of paper - we folded these so they made small "booklets" with SpiderKid on the front. This made it feel more like a game piece and more personal "that one is MINE!" over just a sheet of paper. And it let us tie the passport theme with the locations.

The reading goal prize for kids is "A Super-Action PlayPack." What's that, you ask? Here's the post all about Super-Action PlayPacks!

Kids and parents LOVED the booklets. I talked in my first post about re-vamping the program about how we added sticker collages to reflect weekly visits - these were tied to the passports. They got a stamp in their booklet under the Asgard goal and then went and put their sticker up. This was practically prize enough and kids LOVED collecting the stamps. BUT we still gave away "small prizes." I think this is a way you can bridge "but how will we survive without any prizes? Patrons will complain!" with "Ugh, no more useless junk."

It can be transitional OR you can change what you give-away as "small prizes." One of our greatest changes was letting go of stuff like sticky hands, slinkies, plastic animals and the like and moving to things we can feel OK with as "small prizes." That means bookmarks, pencils, stickers, and erasers. That's IT. Things that can be of use to children, things that are connect to the library. No more junk!

The Asgard goal meant: get a stamp in your passport, put a sticker up on the weekly collage, and get whatever the small prize of the week was. (another big help was rotating the weekly prize and keeping it to just one thing per week.) You needed to do that at least five times to complete Asgard.

Also helpful: setting specific times for the "store" to be open. We gave everyone a whole month to come shop and the opening day wasn't until after the first month of summer activities had passed.

We wanted to do something very similar for the teens. So, again using Rebecca's art and Kate's design skills we made them DOSSIERS instead of passports. (Shout-out to a log shared by Andrea Scherer in Storytime Underground, we modified that to get our superhero/ine symbols for the reading objective.)

You'll notice that we just had a few tweaks but kept the format very similar. But we used different words: objectives instead of goals, dossier instead of passport. Teens earned the same things: passes to the Aquatic Center, a free book, and small weekly prizes for visiting the library. Their weekly prizes were erasers, earbuds, bookmarks, and puzzle cubes, and lanyards. (my gosh they loved those stupid lanyards!) They also got a big "end of summer" treat - finish all the goals and they could come to our after hours lock-in.

Teens definitely had a harder time managing to remember to bring the log - which is of course a consistent problem for teens. I know that's something we have to work on and for this summer,. I'm definitely considering keeping ALL the teen's paperwork AT the library. It might be worth it.

And yes, we had an early literacy component too! Previously, our early literacy element was for 0-5 but I could definitely feel parents (and even the kids) of 4-5 year olds being restless. It felt much more natural to set the literacy goals for 0-3 instead. They worked with the board all summer (we let them put up stickers on the attendance collage too because hey, why not! Another fun way to make them feel included) and got a bag full of early literacy goodies when it was done: a song book or board book, a pass to the Aquatic Center, some crayons and paper, a bib, and some bubbles.

Overall: we definitely learned some lessons! We needed to be more precise in our wording in places. We struggled, as always, with kids and parents losing their logs. But guess what? No one complained about how it "used to be." No one wanted the junky prizes back. Yes, some people wanted to be out of town all summer and still participate and we explained that they were welcome to do that and still get two levels of prizes. That was an actually justifiable answer, when it came right down to it, even if it wasn't always the one they wanted to hear.

I think we turned the program into a true Summer Library Club, not just a reading program of checking off minutes and getting tiny whats-its for every box. And we have more work to do - but now it all feels so much more possible.

How have YOU changed and re-imagined your summer "reading" program? What do your patrons respond to? How do you manage lost logs if you still use paper - do you have a brilliant solution I'm missing? What fun things have you done to re-imagine what your program can be for your community? Do you have any questions I didn't answer here? Let me know about it all here in the comments or chat with me on Twitter!

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Re-Vamping Summer Reading, Part Three: Super-Action Play Packs --- It is the eternal question of youth services in a public library. What the heck do we do about the darn summer reading prizes? How do we stop kids from cheating? WHY are we even giving prizes? Why do we have so much plastic crap?

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Picture This: Follow Up by Dr. Sarah Park Dahlen 

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Picture This: Follow Up by Dr. Sarah Park Dahlen 

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We are blown away by the response to our , CCBC infographic. Many have long been advocating for diversity in children's literature; as we'd hoped, this infographic is pushing this work along. Since September 14, the blog post has had over 36,000 views; my initial tweet made over 17,000 impressions; my Facebook post was shared over 10,000 times, including by writers Cynthia Leitich Smith, Zetta Elliott, Mike Jung Junot Díaz. Professors, teachers, librarians, and students - from K-12 through graduate courses at universities and public libraries across the US and the world - are printing, sharing, displaying, and Ellen Oh, and discussing the infographic.

Of course, with so much visibility came many questions.

Sarah Hannah Gómez pointed out the difference between the white category in the 2012 infographic, and ours, which uses data from 2015. She noted that it may cause folks to think we have made progress. But actually, David included the bunny to show that a significant percentage of children's literature depicts animals and inanimate objects (trucks, cupcakes, screws, etc.) as protagonists, something CCBC Director KT Horning wrote about in her 2013 blog post " I See White People. " The 2012 infographic, created prior to Horning's 2013 post, does not reflect this, so the numbers are not exactly aligned.

Many people wondered about categorization. Where are South Asians? Why are Pacific Islanders included with Asians? Where are Jewish people? etc. Categorizing people (and books) into groups is difficult work. After some discussion, we decided to use pretty much the same category titles as the CCBC; you can read more on their website about how they categorize.

The CCBC's data includes distinct categories for books by, and for books about, each of the demographics they count. The about category may, or may not, include a book in the by category (this happens when an Asian American writer, for example, writes a book that is not about Asian Americans.) For our infographic, we used only the about data. It is vitally important to note that this data does not reflect the quality, accuracy, etc. of the books themselves. It is also vitally important to to note that the number of books about and written and illustrated by #OwnVoices authors is significantly lower.

Our hope is that people will continue to ask questions and do the work that will uncover more information. See Debbie Reese's post " A Close Look at CCBC's 2015 Data on Books By/About Americans Indians/First Nations" for one example of how a scholar unpacked the data, and Jerrold Connors' post " We Need Diverse Books, and How! " for some more graphs. As many have done with our infographic, read everything critically. Who is saying what? What is left unsaid? What more needs to be done?

In short, we still have much work to do.

Note: We made the infographic with a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 4.0 license, so you may download a JPF and PDF here.

Recommended citation: Huyck, David, Sarah Park Dahlen, Molly Beth Griffin. (2016 September 14). Diversity in Children's Books 2015 infographic. sarahpark.com blog. Retrieved from https://readingspark.wordpress.com/2016/09/14/picture-this-reflecting-diversity-in-childrens-book-publishing/

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We are blown away by the response to our , CCBC infographic. Many have long been advocating for diversity in children's literature; as we'd hoped, this infographic is pushing this work along.

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American Indians in Children's Literature  Best Books

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American Indians in Children's Literature  Best Books

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Are you looking for best books by or about American Indians? First Nations?

Below are links to posts on American Indians in Children's Literature and elsewhere that'll help you find ones selected by Native people (me, and other Native people, including members of the American Indian Library Association! This page will be updated, so come back and visit again!

2016: AICL's Best Books of 2016
2015: AICL's Best Books of 2015
2014: AICL's Best Books of 2014

2013: Best Books for Elementary School
2013: Best Books for Middle School
2013: Best Books for High School

2010: Best Books for Elementary School
2010: Best Books for Middle School
2010: Best Books for High School

2007: Encyclopedic Resources for Research Projects

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Here's a list that has lots and lots of gems. In library land, an older publication year often means a book is automatically considered to be "outdated." Thing is, the older books on this list are far superior to new fangled books published today that stereotype and misrepresent Native people. Don't be afraid of older publication years on this list!

2006: Recommended Children's/YA/Reference/Resources

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And did you know the American Indian Library Association has a book award? See what the book committee has selected for distinction:

American Indian Library Association Youth Literature Award

Early in 2014, Betsy Bird of School Library Journal published a list of "Top 100 Books by Indigenous Masters" that I helped compile. It is a mix of writers who write for children and adults.

Top Books by 100 Indigenous Masters

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This page is AICL's gallery of Native writers and illustrators. These are the people that create the very best books!

2014: Gallery of Native Writers and Illustrators

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And this page makes me smile. It is AICL's page at Pinterest.

American Indians in Children's Literature at Pinterest

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Are you looking for best books by or about American Indians? First Nations? Below are links to posts on American Indians in Children's Literature and elsewhere that'll help you find ones selected by Native people (me, and other Native people, including members of the American Indian Library Association!

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Guide for Selecting Anti-Bias Children's Books

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Guide for Selecting Anti-Bias Children's Books

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Based on "Ten Quick Ways to Analyze Children's Books for Racism and Sexism." Updated in 2013.*
Children's books continue to be an invaluable source of information and values. They reflect the attitudes in our society about diversity, power relationships among different groups of people, and various social identities (e.g., racial, ethnic, gender, economic class, sexual orientation, and disability). The visual and verbal messages young children absorb from books (and other media) heavily influence their ideas about themselves and others. Depending on the quality of the book, they can reinforce (or undermine) children's affirmative self-concept, teach accurate (or misleading) information about people of various identities, and foster positive (or negative) attitudes about diversity. Children's books teach children about who is important, who matters, who is even visible. Consequently, carefully choosing quality children's books is an indispensable educational and child-rearing task.

It is important to offer young children a range of books about people like them and their family - as well as about people who are different from them and their family. All of the books should be accurate and appealing to young children. Fortunately, there are some good anti-bias children's books, which are available as a result of the ongoing activism of many individuals and groups over many years. However, while choices have improved over past decades, the lack of quality multicultural kid's books currently being published has frustrated many communities. The number of children of color in the United States continues to rise, but the number of books published by or about people of color stays the same or even decreases.

Check the Illustrations

Look for Stereotypes: A stereotype is an oversimplified generalization about a particular identity group (e.g., gender, race, ethnicity, class, sexual orientation, ability/disability), which usually carries derogatory, inaccurate messages and applies them to ALL people in the group. Stereotypes dehumanize people. So, too, does misinformation. ( See Box 1 below for a list of common, harmful stereotypes).

Unfortunately, all of us absorb socially prevailing stereotypes about a range of people, even if we do not consciously subscribe to them. To alert you to stereotypes in children's books, as well as other media, it is useful to list all the stereotypes you know about various groups of people as precondition for critically reviewing children's books. The books you choose should depict people compassionately and as real human beings. Also consider if images depict all people as genuine individuals with distinctive (rather than stereotypical) features. Books containing stereotypes require you to engage children in critical thinking, but should probably be eliminated from your collection.

BOX 1: Common Harmful/Undermining Stereotypes

Strong, independent girls and women are "manlike"

Book-loving or nonathletic boys and men are "effeminate"

Latino men talk funny, are lazy, gang members, or wear oversize sombreros

Latina women are earth mothers or subservient

African American men are gang members, oversexed, or underemployed

African American women are too independent, oversexed, or "welfare moms"

Arab and/or Muslim men are terrorists

Arab and/or Muslim women are voiceless and passive

All Muslims are Arab / All Arabs are Muslim

American Indians live in teepees, carry bows and arrows, or are half-naked in winter

American Indians were only significant in the past (read)

Disabled people are not independent or are to be pitied

Disabled people must "overcome" their disabilities rather than just live with their disabilities

LGBTQ+ people are invisible

Poor people are invisible

Poor people are depicted as passively needing help from others

AAPI (Asian American Pacific Islanders) are depicted as the "model minority"

AAPI are exotic or their food is exotic/abnormal

All AAPI know martial arts or are meek and compliant

AAPI are portrayed with slanted eyes or just lines to represent eyes

Jewish people are all Zionists (read)

Jewish people are wealthy and yield undue influence in the financial and political world

Look for Tokenism: This is the "one only" message. Regularly seeing only "one" person of any group in a book teaches young children about who is more or less important. Examples of tokenism include books with only one African American child among many white children or having only one book about children with disabilities among many other books. Tokenism also becomes stereotypical. It only allows children to see one view of a group of people, rather than the diversity that exists among all groups.

Look for Invisibility: What children do not see in their books also teaches them about who matters and who doesn't in our society. Invisibility in their storybooks - as well as in textbooks as they get older - undermines children's affirmative sense of themselves and reinforces prejudiced ideas about people who are not seen (See Box 2 for examples of groups who tend to be invisible). The booklists on this website include a great variety of books with groups who are often excluded. (The titles are vetted by Teaching for Change.)

BOX 2: Examples of Groups of People Who Are Often Invisible in Children's Books or Mainstream Media

Families who live in rural areas

Blue-collar workers

Musicians, artists, and writers

Families with two dads or two moms

Single mothers or fathers

Homeless families

Families with an incarcerated parent

People of Middle Eastern descent

Families who practice Islam

Transgender adults and children

Check the Story Line and the Relationships Between People

Even if a book shows visual diversity, the story line may carry biases related to how it handles power relationships among people of various identities. Are whites or male characters the central figures with people of color or female characters in essentially supporting roles? To gain acceptance and/or approval does a child of color, a girl, or child with a disability have to exhibit extraordinary qualities or be the one to understand, forgive, or change? Are the achievements of girls and women based on their own initiative and intelligence, or are they due to their looks or relationship with boys/men?

Are people of color, women, low-income families, or people with disabilities depicted as needing help or in passive roles, while whites, men, and "able-bodied" people are in leadership and action roles? How are problems presented, conceived, and resolved? Who typically causes a problem and who resolves it? Your book collection needs a balance of different people in "doer" roles.

Look at Messages About Different Lifestyles

Do the lives of people of color or people living in poverty in the story contrast unfavorably with the norm of white, middle-class suburban life? Are negative value judgments implied about ways of life that differ from the dominant culture or economic class (e.g., people are to be pitied, or the story is about one person who "gets out" of the less desirable way of life)? Do images and information go beyond oversimplification and offer genuine insights into the lifestyle of the characters in the story? Does the setting reflect current life - or past assumptions about life? Does your book collection depict diversity among people within a specific racial/ethnic group, such as a range of family structures, living environments, socioeconomic conditions and types of work, and male/female roles within the family? (Remember that every racial/ethnic group has diversity, including people who self-identify as white).

Consider the Effects on Children's Self and Social Identities

In addition to specific books, also examine your book collection. Do your books reinforce or counteract messages that teach children to feel inferior or superior because of their skin color, gender, family income, able-bodiedness, or type of family structure? At school, will all of the children you serve see themselves and their family's way of life reflected in your book collection? Will all children of color, including those with mixed heritage, girls, and children from the many types of family structures, children living in poverty, and children with disabilities see one or more characters with whom they can readily and positively identify? If they are visible in your book collection, are the illustrations and information accurate and respectful? Does your overall collection balance the backgrounds of all the children in your program? Does it also show diversity within the social indentity groups to which the children belong (e.g., a range of ways to be female and male, families reflecting different kinds of jobs within a racial/ethnic group). Does your book collection also include a balance between diversity within your classroom and beyond your classroom?

At home, does your book collection reflect diversity among the groups to which your family belongs? Does it have stories about people like you who have contributed to creating a more just world? Does it also include a range of books showing diversity beyond your family and neighborhood?

Look for Books About Children and Adults Engaging in Actions for Change

To fully develop a strong sense of self and a disposition toward cooperation and fairness, children need to know how to stand up for themselves and others when faced with unfairness. They also need to know about people from all social identity groups who have - and are currently - working for justice for all. In addition to previous criteria, here are more items to consider: The story line should be about children and adults working together, rather than perpetrating the myth that change happens because of special, individual people who do it by themselves. Does your book collection include a balance of people who have made important and honored contributions to American life as well as the world community - and not just the traditional white, male "heroes?" Do some of your books about important people include struggles for justice? Do they show people who were/are poor or from racial/ethnic groups of color? Are people with disabilities engaged in these struggles for justice?

Consider the Author's or Illustrator's Background and Perspective

All authors write from a cultural as well as from a personal context. In the past, most children's books were by authors and illustrators who were white and members of the middle class. As a result, a single cultural and class perspective dominated children's literature. There are now excellent books by people of color from a range of backgrounds - although not nearly enough. Consider the biographical material on the jacket flap or back of the book. What qualifies the author or illustrator to deal with the subject? If the book is not about people or events similar to the author or illustrator's background, what specifically recommends them as creators of the book? What is the author's attitude toward her/his story characters? Are the images accurate and do the illustrators respectfully render the people in the story? Do you have books reflecting a balanced range of author and illustrator identities and experiences?

Watch for Loaded Words

A word is loaded when it in any way demeans or makes people invisible because of any of their identities. One example is the generic use of the word "man" to stand for women as well as men (although the opposite never occurs). This traditional terminology is now questioned by many because of its sexist implications. Here are some examples of ways to avoid sexist language: community instead of brotherhood; firefighters inserted of firemen; human family instead of family of man; ancestors instead of forefathers; chairperson instead of chairman. Examples of adjectives applied to people of color that carry racist messages include: "savage," "primitive," "superstitious," "backward," "inscrutable" and "treacherous." Always consider the context in which a word is used and to whom it applies.

Look at the Copyright Date

Copyright dates indicate the publication year, not the time of its writing, which might be two to three years before the copyright date. Although a recent copyright date is no guarantee of a book's relevance or sensitivity, copyright dates are useful information. More children's books began to reflect the reality of a pluralistic society and nonsexist and non-ableist perspectives in the 1970s. Since then, the range of accurate, respectful, and caring books reflecting diversity has increased significantly (unfortunately the diversity of books published in the United States still does not accurately reflect the actual diversity of the people living here). When considering new books for your collection, begin with most recently published ones and then continue with descending copyright dates.

Assess the Appeal of the Story and Illustrations to Young Children

Although these guidelines focus on the messages about diversity and equality reflected in children's books, it is also important to take quality into account. Be sure the book is a "good read." If children find the story or illustrations boring, a book will not hold their attention, even if the book adds a specific kind of diversity you need. Check for active, interesting story lines where different kinds of people are integral to the people in the story, not the main topic. For example, in A Chair for My Mother, a young child tries to save money to get a comfortable chair for her waitress mother. Although the book shows a single parent, working-class family, and a resourceful girl, it is not didactic. Also look for illustrations that are colorful and recognizable to young children. Although they enjoy a range of styles, illustrations that are too subdued or abstract may not hold their attention.

Check for age appropriateness. Most booksellers list any picture book as appropriate for early childhood even if the story line is really for primary grade children. Sometimes a book for older children will work if you simplify the story or "tell" the story rather than read it. In some cases, this is the only way to get books that present specific groups of children (e.g., stories with Cambodian children or children with learning disabilities). Some additional issues to consider:

Many children's books use animal characters instead of people and there are some excellent books that explore diversity with animal characters (e.g., And Tango Makes Three or A Coyote Solstice Tale). Children enjoy these. However, such books are not a substitute for exploring issues of diversity and anti-bias fairness with people as the main characters.

Some early childhood teachers wonder if it is necessary for every book in their collection to show diversity. Every book needs to be accurate, caring, and respectful. However, you will want individual books about specific kinds of people (e.g., a biracial family or a family with adopted children). Diversity becomes essential in the balance of your book collection, where you want to avoid invisibility or tokenism of any group.

Folk and fairy tales have long been a mainstay of children's literature. In the cultures from which they come, folk and fairy tales were used to teach important lessons and values related to their culture of origin. Children love them in their original versions - not their commercially sanitized adaptations. However, folk and fairy tales also carry messages that convey sexism, classism, and racism and must be used thoughtfully as part of introducing young children to diversity and anti-bias values of quality and fairness.

Overuse of folk tales to "teach" about a specific ethnic/cultural group leads to misinformation and confusion. They are about animals and occasionally people from a mythical past and are designed to teach core values and beliefs in their culture of origin. They are not about how people actually live in contemporary society - and that is what young children need to understand. Information and images about how people really live now is what enables young children to build connections to people who are from different cultures while countering stereotypes that children have already absorbed (e.g., how American Indians really live).

Finally there is the somewhat sensitive issue of what to do about "classic" or "well-beloved" children's books. Many of these are wonderful as children's literature, but unfortunately they often convey values of sexism, racism, ableism, or even colonialism. People who love the books that pose this dilemma argue that it is OK to use them because they "reflect their times," which they imply somehow excuses their biased messages. For example, I adored the Babar series of books as a young child and was unpleasantly shocked to realize as an adult how much the images and story lines reflected messages of European colonialism in Africa. I chose not to use them with my own children, wanting them to learn accurate information about how people in Africa really live. Not sharing childhood favorites may sadden some, but it is far better than the harm caused by reinforcing messages of racism and colonialism.
In a nutshell - as you choose books or critically examine your current book selection, always keep in mind the power of books - their words and their images - to nurture or, conversely, to undermine a child's sense of self, positive attitude toward others, and motivation to act for fairness.
Additional Resources

Louise Derman-Sparks is an internationally respected anti-bias educator and author (along with Julie Olsen Edwards) of Anti-Bias Education for Young Children and Ourselves. She has co-authored several additional books with Dr. Carol Brunson Day (Teaching/Learning Anti-Racism), the ABC Task Force ( Anti-Bias Curriculum: Tools for Empowering Young Children), Dr. Patricia Ramsey (What If All the Kids Are White?), and Dr. John Nimmo and Debbie Leekeenan ( Leading Anti-Bias Early Childhood Programs: A Guide for Change). She speaks throughout the United States and abroad, and served on the NAEYC Governing Board from 1998 to 2001. Louise has a lifelong commitment to building a more just society for all people. Her children Douglass and Holly, now grown, were her inspiration. A Pacific Oaks College faculty member for 33 years - when its mission and pedagogy reflected anti-bias education principles - Louise is now retired.
*In 1980, the Council on Interracial Books for Children published the book Guidelines for Selecting Bias-Free Textbooks and Storybooks. A shorter version of the book in pamphlet form, "Ten Quick Ways to Analyze Children's Books for Racism and Sexism," followed. One of the first guides written for teachers and families, it became an invaluable tool for hundreds of thousands of people. Both the book and pamphlet have been out of print for several years. Rethinking Schools published their adaptation of the original Guidelines in 1994.

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Guide for Selecting Anti-Bias Children's Books - Social Justice Books

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By Louise Derman-Sparks Based on "Ten Quick Ways to Analyze Children's Books for Racism and Sexism." Updated in 2013.* Children's books continue to be an invaluable source of information and values. They reflect the attitudes in our society about diversity, power relationships among different groups of people, and various social identities (e.g., racial, ethnic, gender, [...]

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26 Children’s Books to Support Conversations on Race, Racism & Resistance

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26 Children’s Books to Support Conversations on Race, Racism & Resistance

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We're The People Summer Reading Booklists

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We're The People Summer Reading Booklists

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Summer Reading 2017 PDF
Are you looking for books to add to your summer reading list? Ones written or illustrated by Native Americans or people of color and some that intersect with LGBT+ or disabilities? Take a look at these! We've spent the past year reading and re-reading these books to eliminate microaggressions, stereotypes and others instances that work against social justice and inclusion.

Annotated list created by Thaddeus Andracki, Edith Campbell, Sujei Lugo, Lyn Miller-Lachmann, and Edward Spicer.

Yoo, Paula; illustrated by Dom Lee. Sixteen Years in Sixteen Seconds: The Sammy Lee Story. The true story of Sammy Lee, a Korean American who became the first Asian American to win Olympic gold for the USA. His story takes us a back to time when the odds were stacked against him achieving any kind of success, but through courage and fortitude, he persevered. (Lee and Low, 2005). English; English Braille. Notable Books for a Global Society Award Winner, "New Voices" Lee & Low Award Winner.

Chapter Books/ Beginning Readers

Alkhayyate, Mithaa retold by Vivian French and translated by Fatima Sharafeddini. My Own Special Way. Hamda, the youngest sister wants to wear a hijab because her sisters do but, she needs help figuring out her own style of wearing one. (Orion Children's, 2012). English; Arabic.

Philip, Aaron and Tonya Bolden. This Kid Can Fly: It's About Ability (Not Disability). This memoir by the blogger of Aaronverse explores the life of an immigrant from Antigua, born with cerebral palsy who comes to NYC for medical treatment and is now a high school student in Manhattan. It addresses the challenges that Aaron faces, including difficulties making friends and getting around, bouts of homelessness, his parents' separation due to economic and visa issues, and his father's heart attack. (HarperCollins Children/Balzer + Bray, 2016). English.

Dos Santos, Steven. The Culling (The Torch Keeper series). In this dystopian society, love does nothing but complicate choices about who lives and who dies. Falling for Digory, a fellow recruit, doesn't help Lucky's choices one bit. (Flux, 2013). English.

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We're The People: Summer Reading 2017 Summer Reading 2017 PDF Are you looking for books to add to your summer reading list? Ones written or illustrated by Native Americans or people of color and some that intersect with LGBT+ or disabilities? Take a look at these!

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Race and Social Justice for Kids Booklist 

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Race and Social Justice for Kids Booklist 

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Race and Social Justice for Kids - Chicago Public Library

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Race and Social Justice for Kids by ChiPubLib_Kids : Want to open a conversation about race and social justice with your family? These books are a great place to start.

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Presentation by Angie Manfredi

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In recent weeks, white supremacists have marched in the streets with tiki torches and rebel flags, wearing red Make America Great Again hats, protecting Confederate statues and monuments from removal. The President of the United States didn't outright condemn these hate groups, but rather played footsy with Neo-Nazis, the KKK and all iterations of white supremacist terrorism. Many are hollering that this America isn't their America. But for many of us, this racism has always been part of the great American way. There is no America without it; this country was literally built upon it.

And now America's hood has come off for a few.

But Young Adult books are holding a mirror up to the racism in American society, exposing its ugly underbelly, and telling hard truths to arm the next generation with the tools they need to face it.

Add these 10 must-read books to your list, and make sure every teen in your life reads them.

Living legend Congressman John Lewis (GA-5) shares his remarkable, first-hand account of his historic march and the strides he made in the Civil Rights movement. His personal story takes us on a journey from his childhood on an Alabama sharecropper's farm and in segregated schools to the 1963 March on Washington, all the way to Congress, where he works to insure the civil rights of all Americans. This series of graphic novels guarantees that America will never forget those who paved the way forward.

This is a Romeo and Juliet tale featuring two kids on opposite sides of the immigration debate line. Michael goes to anti-immigrant rallies with his parents, and it all makes sense to him. Mina is a Muslim refugee from Afghanistan and has just started attending Michael's school. Michael's family politics start to get sticky, and Mina faces hurdles as she tries to make friends at her new school. Both must decide where they stand and if they can love each other across this cultural divide. This book makes the political personal through the lens of an engaging love story, in which two teens are caught in a storm of opinions about religion, refugees, immigration, Islamophobia and who has the right to be called an Australian.

Sixteen years old, budding filmmaker Steve Harmon writes a movie script in his journal-one in which his own life is at stake. He's on trial for the fatal shooting of a convenience-store owner and chronicling the court proceedings and his experience in jail as he awaits his fate. The prosecutor calls him a monster for his alleged role in the shooting. But Myers unearths the painful inequality at the heart of our justice system, where not everyone is entitled to a fair trial or treated equally in a court of justice. This should be required reading for all students in America to understand that the color of one's skin often dictates one's experience in the American criminal justice system.

Black 16-year-old Tariq Johnson is shot and killed by Jack Franklin, a white man. Sound familiar? As Tariq's community tries to piece their lives back together again, readers will discover that no two accounts of the incident tell the whole truth. Everyone struggles to make sense of how everything went down. But all readers should question the things they think are true about how the media portrays boys who wear hoodies and look like Tariq.

Justyce McAllister is near perfect-smartest in his class, Ivy League college bound, and an all-around good guy-but being respectable and accomplished often doesn't matter to the police. To them, he's just another black boy. After being arrested for a crime he didn't commit, he seeks to understand what happened to him by turning to the teachings of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. for answers. He writes to his hero in his journal. But when he goes on a joyride with his best friend Manny, and an off-duty cop targets them, he's under attack again and must think about what Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. might have done. This book dismantles the idea that if you're near-perfect and do everything right, racism won't affect you.

Two teens-one black and one white-face the ugly truth that they are not treated equally by the police. When Rashad goes to buy chips at a bodega, a cop mistakes him for a shoplifter and almost beats him to death. The witness, Quinn, the cop's surrogate son, wrestles with the difficult and complicated truth that sometimes our heroes can be flawed. As the school takes sides, Rashad and Quinn must confront their new realities and face consequences that they never have before. This award-winning book kicks open on an ugly American truism-the skin you're born in dictates how you're treated by the police.

Like many marginalized American teens, 16-year-old Starr Carter straddles two worlds: the neighborhood where she lives and the fancy school she attends. When her best friend Khalil is fatally shot by a police officer, her life descends into chaos as his catastrophic death becomes a national headline. Starr must wrestle with what went down that night, and what she might say may set the world on fire. Award-winning and slated to become a film next year starring Amandla Sternberg, Common, Issa Rae and many more, The Hate U Give shines a painful light on why black men and boys are targeted by the police and how their communities are shattered as a result.

Under the backdrop of the 1937 New London school explosion, one of the worst disasters in American history, this book pushes two kids together across the most powerful line at the time: the color line. In East Texas, you don't mix with people who aren't your kind. Naomi Vargas and Wash Fuller understand this deeply. These kinds of things are reinforced and there are painful consequences for failing to understand-even death. But sometimes love pushes you to cross the boundaries of everything you've ever known despite the risk. This book unpacks the complicated history of the school explosion and challenges readers to dig into how the forces of love, community and segregation shape people.

Alfonso Jones just bought his first suit. But an off-duty police officer mistakes the clothes hanger for a gun, and shoots Alfonso. When Alfonso wakes up, he's in the afterlife on a train with well-known victims of police violence, and he must now face his new reality while his family and friends mourn for him at home. This graphic novel (scheduled for an October 15th release date) cracks open the scars left behind when people are lost from communities at the hands of police violence.

Marvin just wanted to tag along to a party with his twin brother, Tyler. But when a shooting happens and the police show up, chaos unfolds. Tyler goes missing, and Marvin is on a mission to find him. But when Tyler is found dead and a video surfaces online showing Tyler shot by a police officer, the community erupts. Marvin must figure out what justice looks like for the dead. This can't-miss book (due out in March 2018) lays open the wound of having to watch brutalized black bodies and the death of loved ones being thrust onto the social media stage, and how one makes sense of fairness in the world after such a loss.

Dhonielle Clayton is the co-author of the Tiny Pretty Things series and the forthcoming The Belles. A former teacher and middle school librarian, Dhonielle is co-founder of CAKE Literary-a creative development company whipping up decidedly diverse books for a wide array of readers-and COO of the non-profit We Need Diverse Books. You can find her online at www.dhonielleclayton.com or follow her on Twitter.

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In recent weeks, white supremacists have marched in the streets with tiki torches and rebel flags, wearing red Make America Great Again hats, protecting Confederate statues and monuments from removal. The President of the United States didn't outright condemn these hate groups, but rather played footsy with Neo-Nazis, the KKK and all iterations of white supremacist terrorism.

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We Need Diverse Comics. 2,626 likes · 77 talking about this. Celebrating & promoting diversity in all forms of comics along with their creators and...

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'We don't make princesses in those colours': words I didn't expect to hear in 2017

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'We don't make princesses in those colours': words I didn't expect to hear in 2017

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uring the first couple of years or so of my young girl's life, I worried primarily about keeping her alive. During infancy, everything was a choking hazard. In toddlerhood, every sharp corner seemed determined to encounter her head. After those fragile and harrowing first two years, I turned my attention to more emotional and spiritual concerns. I focused on teaching her to be kind, brave, and curious. I taught her that princesses were cool if they did things besides just hanging about in castles, looking pretty and waiting to be rescued.

These days, I'm working on teaching her perseverance, stranger-danger and sticking up for herself. I want her to be happy and I want her to know that happiness is something you work at. The easiest thing to be in this world is unhappy.

One of the things I want most though is for her to love herself. Part of loving yourself is loving the skin you're in. I mean this metaphorically and literally, but right now I'm focusing on the literal meaning. I'm Jamaican-American and my husband is American of Korean descent. Our daughter's skin colour is brown and I need to teach her to love the skin she's in. How do I do that in a country with as huge a race problem as America? America is a country that loves the theory that all men are created equal, but doesn't love the practice.

How do I teach her that she's smart and beautiful and that she can be anyone she wants to be when the country and media tell her otherwise? Or completely erases her outright? How many cartoons and TV shows feature only white boys and girls? How many black and brown and Asian characters (if you can find any at all) are relegated to the position of lowly side-kick?

Nicola Yoon, with her daughter and husband. Photograph: Penguin

This struggle to show my little girl positive representation is something I fight for every day. I fight by exposing her to media that depicts characters of colour in a beautiful way. I fight in my own books by making the main characters people of colour. My books reflect the diverse and beautiful world that we live in. I'm even part of an activist organisation dedicated to increasing diversity in children's media, We Need Diverse Books.

But what else can I be doing? It's a question I'm always asking myself. And a few weeks ago, part of the answer presented itself to me.

My daughter is now five. What this means is that most of my weekends are spent at kids' birthday parties eating pizza and cupcakes and singing Happy Birthday woefully off key. Such was the case a few weekends ago. It was a pizza-making party at a local pizza place. Picture 20 five-year-olds and their parents kneading dough, spreading sauce, sprinkling cheese and layering pepperoni. Like anything else involving five-year-olds, it was complete chaos and lots of fun at the same time. While the pizzas were baking, the kids lined up to get balloons made. This is pretty standard fare at these parties. Usually there's a face painter or a balloon artist. At the fancier parties, there's both.

I'd never seen a balloon artist this good before. I'm not exaggerating when I say she was phenomenal. She could make anything the kids asked of her, and she was fast. The kids didn't even have time to get impatient and whiny. She was so skilled that she didn't have to look while she was constructing her elaborate creations. She made foot-long flower crowns, castles. She even made a car.

After pizza and juice, she decided to make more creations to leave behind - extras in case some child inevitably popped their own by accident. By making extras she was sparing some poor parent the tears and drama. Along with the standards - swords, butterflies, crowns - she also made elaborate princesses, complete with hair and arms and a gown. She drew faces on each with black markers.

All the princesses were white. Which is to say, she used the peach balloons blown up into perfect spheres for the faces. I noticed this after the fifth or sixth balloon drifted by. I checked out the balloon collection on her tool belt. There were three shades of brown balloons. My little girl was too busy eating cake to notice the princesses, but eventually she would and she'd want one. I wanted her to have one that had her skin colour. At the very least, I wanted her to see that brown princess balloons existed. I went over to the balloon artist and I asked her if she could make one using the brown balloons. She replied - and I'm quoting, because I remember what she said exactly - with this: "We don't make princesses in those colours."

Nicola Yoon ... 'What I found astonishing ... was that she'd never thought to make brown faces in the first place.' Photograph: Sonya Sones

I told her that I didn't understand. She had the balloons there on her tool belt. She said yes, she had brown balloons, but they weren't the right type to make faces. She looked away from me and kept making her peach princess. And then she shrugged. I sort of nodded and walked away from her. In the moment, I was so taken aback that I didn't know what to say. I found my husband and told him about the exchange. I won't repeat what he said, but he was angry.

I'm non-confrontational. Fights make me uncomfortable. I'll avoid them if I can. Moreover, I'm a sunny sort. Optimistic. A benefit-of-the-doubt giver. I believe that people are mostly good. I believe that if people know the right thing to do, they'll mostly do it.

So, here's the thing: I believed her about the brown balloons. I had no reason not to. They probably weren't the right type for making faces. I don't think she was lying to me because she didn't want to make a brown princess. What I found astonishing though was that she'd never thought to make brown faces in the first place.

Surely, I couldn't have been the first person to ask. And if I were, why hadn't it mattered to other parents? Why didn't it matter to her?

I get asked about diversity in children's literature a lot. I'm the first black writer to hit No 1 on the New York Times young adult list. My first book, Everything, Everything, has been made into a movie, and my second one, The Sun is Also a Star, is a National Book Award finalist and has been optioned by MGM and Warner Bros. I answer all these diversity questions patiently. When I tour, I make sure to talk about why diversity in children's literature is important to me and why it should be important to everyone. The leading characters in my books are people of colour and will continue to be.

Back at the party, my husband asked me if I wanted him to say something. I said no. I said I wanted to do it. I went back over to her and I said: It's not OK that you don't make princesses in that colour. She started to explain again about the types of balloons. I heard her out and then I said: "It's still not OK. There are brown princesses. There are black princesses and it's not OK for you to do that." We made eye contact and I held it. She nodded and said, "OK." And I walked away again. I don't know if what I said mattered to her. I don't know if she'll do the same thing at the next party.

Here's what I do know: I won't shy away from these awkward conversations any more. I'll say the thing that needs to be said. I don't mind being a little uncomfortable. It's worth it if it means we can make a better world.

Here's another thing that I know: It's 2017 and princesses come in all colours. It's time everyone knew that. It's past time.

Nicola Yoon is the author of Everything, Everything and The Sun is Also a Star, published by Random House Children's Books. The film Everything, Everything is on general release in the UK

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'We don't make princesses in those colours': words I didn't expect to hear in 2017

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uring the first couple of years or so of my young girl's life, I worried primarily about keeping her alive. During infancy, everything was a choking hazard. In toddlerhood, every sharp corner seemed determined to encounter her head. After those fragile and harrowing first two years, I turned my attention to more emotional and spiritual concerns.

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1. Buffalo Song by Joseph Bruchac, illustrated by Bill Farnsworth

The story of how the buffalo nearly became extinct, but because people cared enough and worked together we can still enjoy the American buffalo today. It offers insight to the meaning and importance of the buffalo to Native people from yesteryear to today. Based on true events, it reveals the consequences of one small buffalo being rescued by a boy and his father.

I believe the author said he spent sixteen years researching this true story. When I read it, I like to have the children sing with me. As a tribal librarian, this story allowed me to share the past, present, and future of buffalo. Today, the buffalo are no longer in danger, and we can enjoy them in the wild but also purchase the healthier bison meat. It is because of people coming together that this is possible.

Before reading this story with the children, I would share: Imagine if I could give you a gift and that gift gave you the shoes that you are wearing. Now imagine if that same gift provided your clothes, food, and even your shelter or home. What might you say to the creator that gave you such a gift? How would you care for such a gift? [picture book, ages 7 and up]

2. The Story of Jumping Mouse by John Steptoe

One of the smallest creatures-the mouse-is drawn to the sound of the river and the idea of reaching the top of a mountain. His journey gives him a new name, "Jumping Mouse." Along the way he discovers that he can help those in great need. The sacrifice is huge, but he freely gives, and his award in the end is life changing.

This story is precious to me because the mouse while being so small is nonetheless unafraid. Even when a buffalo and a wolf cross his path, the mouse doesn't let his feelings of awe overcome him; instead, he humbly revels in the realization that a little mouse like he might be able to help them. Indeed, he helps the two strangers freely without question. If only we could be like the tiny mouse. One of my favorite sayings is to remember whatever we do is not wasted, and, of, course everything we do does come back. [picture book, ages 7 and up]

3. Welcome Song for Baby by Richard Van Camp

This board book is true to its title-a song to welcome a baby. Every child deserves to hear how dear, loved, cherished, and beautiful they are and how they are making the world a better place. A promise and thank you sung to the gift: the baby.

This book is a song, and I have found that babies will stop crying to listen to it sung softly. But more than that, babies need to hear the sweet words of welcome that are in this book. Siblings could easily learn the words to sing to a new brother or sister. The photographs are excellent, and I found even the youngest of children enjoy looking at real photographs. (One of my younger patrons with autism especially enjoyed books that included photographs with faces.) [picture book, ages infant and up]

Read the full list & enter the giveaway here.

1. Emanuel's Dream by Lauri Ann Thompson, illustrated by Sean Qualls

I love true stories and this true story of Emmanual Ofos Yeboah is so inspiring! Because his mother believes he can teach himself how to gain the skills he does just that. The fact he is missing part of one leg doesn't limit him. Emmanuels quote at the end of the book says it all: "In this world, we are not perfect. We can only do our best." [picture book, ages 4 and up]

2. My Three Best Friends and Me, Zulay by Cari Best, illustrated by Vanessa Brantley-Newton

This is a fun story that takes place at school. It portrays inclusion in a wonderful way. Zulay becomes just another child participating in Field Day. At first she seems different because she is blind but then she is like every other child competing at school. [picture book, ages 4 and up]

3. Max the Champion by Sean Stockdale and Alexandra Strick, illustrated by Ros Asquith

I like this story because it's about following your passion. Max loves sports and he and other children with all types of abilities enjoy playing together. The fact that Max has a hearing aid doesn't interfere with his inclusion in the sports he loves. [picture book, ages 4 and up]

Read the full list here.

1. Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred D. Taylor

I first read this novel the same year I first saw Star Wars, when I was ten or eleven. Both experiences linger in my memory nearly 40 years later. It wasn't the first time I'd read books with Black protagonists (that would be Ezra Jack Keats' brilliant picture books), but it was the first time I'd read about the brutality of racism. Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry is set in 1930's Mississippi-Taylor sets the scene so well that by the time you're done reading you'll be able to taste the rust-colored dust of the dirt roads.

Cassie is an indomitable heroine. Every time I read her story, I alternate between feeling terror and elation as she confronts everything from racist insults to horrific threats against her person. But the true brilliance of the novel is the theme of fire running throughout it, beginning with the horribly burnt body of Mr. Berry and ending with a forest fire-it serves as a stark metaphor for the all-consuming nature of racism. [chapter book, ages 11 and up]

2. M.C. Higgins the Great by Virginia Hamilton

I think I loved this book because I identified so strongly with the protagonist: Mayo Cornelius Higgins, a brainy, disaffected young man who watches the world from atop a 40' steel pole. Like M.C., I climbed everything in sight. (Trees, buildings... I never had a 40' pole, but I have no doubt I would have tried to climb it. My favorite place was a tree covered in vines-I could climb up, stick my head out the top, and gaze over what looked like a leafy meadow suspended 60' above the ground.) I also identified with the alliance M.C. builds with his neighbors, the light-skinned, red-headed Killburns. I never tried to build a wall with the Black kids who lived next door to me-Mark, Todd, and Glen-but we did build some wicked BMX ramps together! Years after I first read M.C. Higgins the Great, I met Virginia Hamilton and she signed a copy for me. I wish I'd bought a hardcover, but at that point I was in college and nearly broke. I also wish my handwriting were half as lovely as hers:

If you enjoy M.C. Higgins the Great, don't miss The Planet of Junior Brown and The House of Dies Drear, my other favorite Hamilton novels. [chapter book, ages 11 and up]

3. Monster by Walter Dean Myers

I could have put lots of Myers books on this list, but this is the one that haunted my dreams for months after I read it. The protagonist, Steve, is facing 25-years to life for a crime he didn't commit. Myers tells the story entirely through diary entries and a screenplay Steve is writing. But the real story here is Steve's inner battle, as he struggles to reject the label society has already branded him with: Monster. [young adult, ages 13 and up]

Read the full list and enter the giveaway here.

1. Flight School by Lita Judge

Little Penguin wants to fly - no matter what anyone says about aeronautical deficiencies of the penguin body. He perseveres, relying more on willpower than talent. Eventually, adding an encouraging teacher and a dash of teamwork allows Little Penguin to soar to new heights. I love how this story makes you believe in miracles - even if they need a little assistance. [picture book, ages 4 and up]

2. Chrysanthemum by Kevin Henkes

Chrysanthemum loves the uniqueness of her name until she realizes at school that unique means different and that different isn't always accepted. Her self-esteem is deeply affected by her classmates making her feel out of place. But Chrysanthemum finds a kindred spirit and learns a lesson I myself have struggled with often - that even things (and people) that don't seem to belong do actually belong somewhere. [picture book, ages 4 and up]

3. Unlike Other Monsters by Audrey Vernick,‎ illustrated by Colin Jack

Everyone knows monsters don't have friends, so Zander (himself a monster) isn't surprised by his friendless state. But while he is unsurprised, he is also disappointed. Unlike other monsters, Zander longs for friendship - which he thinks he may have found in the form of a little red bird. Before Zander can truly bond with his new friend he has to learn to let go of other people's (or other monsters') expectations and give himself permission to be himself. A sweet story of finding new friends and also of finding yourself. [picture book, ages 5 and up]

Read the full list and enter the giveaway here.

1. Fred Stays with Me by Nancy Coffelt, illustrated by Tricia Tusa

A little girl whose parents are divorced splits her time between her mom's house and her dad's. Her dog, the eponymous Fred, also moves between homes, which gives her a sense of stability and consistency in her co-parenting, joint-custody family arrangement. [picture book, ages 3 and up]

2. Stella Brings the Family by Miriam Schiffer Baker, illustrated by Holly Clifton-Brown

Stella has two dads and isn't quite sure what to do for her class's Mother's Day celebration. Ultimately, she decides to bring both of her parents, as well as other family members who nurture her, and they are all affirmed and welcomed by everyone at school. [picture book, ages 5 and up]

3. Real Sisters Pretend by Megan Dowd Lambert, illustrated by Nicole Tadgell

Inspired by two of the author's daughters, this is a story about adoptive sisters, Mia (who is multiracial) and Tayja (who is Back), who affirm their bonds with one another after a stranger questions whether they are "real sisters" since they don't look alike. They punctuate their pretend play with conversation about their adoption stories, and it all culminates in a warm family hug with their two moms. [picture book, ages 4 and up]

Read the full list here.

1. Rani Patel In Full Effect by Sonia Patel

My debut novel is about how a Gujarati Indian American teen growing up on the rural Hawaiian island of Molokai uses her love for hip hop and rap to navigate the emotional and interpersonal sequalae of incest and rape. The main character, Rani, is based on a mix of my experiences, those of patients I've treated and girls/women I've known. [young adult, ages 13 and up]

2. Jaya and Rasa: A Love Story by Sonia Patel

My second novel is about the love the grows between a transgender Gujarati Indian boy and a sex trafficked mixed ethnicity girl after their chance meeting on a mountain trail in Hawaii. Both characters are based on amalgams of real patients I've treated and their experiences. [young adult, ages 13 and up]

3. Push by Sapphire

I love the main character in this book, a black teenager growing up in Harlem. Her story is brutal and realistic. I've heard similar stories in my work as a child & adolescent psychiatrist. [young adult, ages 13 and up]

Read the full list and enter the 5 book giveaway here.

Eric and Natalie Yoder, authors of Short Mysteries You Solve With Math, share their book list " Middle Grade Spanish/English Bilingual Books." Check out the preview below and the full list on the Multicultural Children's Book Day website.

1. One Minute Mysteries: Short Mysteries You Solve With Math/Misterios de un Minuto: Misterios Cortos Que Resuelves con Matematicas by Eric Yoder & Natalie Yoder

Now you can solve mysteries in English, Spanish or both! This award-winning title is now available as a bilingual book. Use it to expand your language and math skills at the same time. Each math mystery takes just one minute to read, and challenges a child's knowledge in essential, age-appropriate math topics. [chapter book, ages 10 and up]

2. Cool Salsa: Bilingual Poems on Growing Up Latino in the United States edited by Lori Marie Carlson

Growing up Latino in America means speaking two languages, living two lives, learning the rules of two cultures. This book of poetry celebrates the tones, rhythms, sounds, and experiences of that double life. Here are poems about families and parties, insults and sad memories, hot dogs and mangos. [chapter book, ages 8 and up]

3. In My Family/En mi familia by Carmen Lomas Garza

This book is a tribute to the family and community that shaped the author's childhood and life. Lomas Garza's vibrant paintings and warm personal stories depict memories of growing up in the traditional Mexican-American community of her hometown of Kingsville, Texas. [chapter book, ages 6 and up]

Read the full list here.

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Style Hatch - http://stylehatch.co | @stylehatch

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1. Buffalo Song by Joseph Bruchac, illustrated by Bill Farnsworth The story of how the buffalo nearly became extinct, but because people cared enough and worked together we can still enjoy the American buffalo today. It offers insight to the meaning and importance of the buffalo to Native people from yesteryear to today.

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Interview with Cynthia Levinson, author of The Youngest Marcher: The Story of Audrey Faye Hendricks, A Young Civil Rights Activist, illustrated by Vanessa Brantley Newton (Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2017) AG: Thanks for helping us to launch M is ... Continue reading Cynthia Levinson: "The Youngest Marcher"

I was first introduced to Daniel Camacho's art through the children's book he illustrated, Joelito's Big Decision/La Gran Decisison de Joelito. Ann Berlack, the author, had contacted me with some questions about the book, and I was excited to help ... Continue reading Daniel Camacho: "I always liked drawing on walls"

One of my earliest memories from first grade is being on the playground with one of the handful of other Indian-American kids in the school, when a group of older girls approached us. They told us that they were vanilla ... Continue reading Supriya Kelkar: "Finding Your Voice"

AG: Congratulations on the release of your newest book, The Wedding Portrait! Your picture books focus on activism while having roots in very personal stories. You wrote A is for Activist for your son. My Night in the Planetarium is ... Continue reading Innosanto Nagara: "The Wedding Portrait"

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Interview with Cynthia Levinson, author of The Youngest Marcher: The Story of Audrey Faye Hendricks, A Young Civil Rights Activist, illustrated by Vanessa Brantley Newton (Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2017) AG: Thanks for helping us to launch M is ...

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The Windows and Mirrors of your Child's Bookshelf by Grace Lin

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The Windows and Mirrors of your Child's Bookshelf by Grace Lin

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The Windows and Mirrors of Your Child's Bookshelf | Grace Lin | TEDxNatick

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What to do when you realize classic books from your childhood are racist

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What to do when you realize classic books from your childhood are racist

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What to do when you realize classic books from your childhood are racist

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The danger of a single story by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

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The danger of a single story by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

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Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: The Danger of a Single Story | TED

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5 Things You Should Know About Racism | Decoded | MTV News

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5 Things You Should Know About Racism | Decoded | MTV News

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5 Things You Should Know About Racism | Decoded | MTV News

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Ever find yourself in a conversation about race and identity where you just get...stuck? Code Switch can help. We're all journalists of color, and this isn't just the work we do. It's the lives we lead. Sometimes, we'll make you laugh. Other times, you'll get uncomfortable. But we'll always be unflinchingly honest and empathetic.

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BFFs Kathy Tu and Tobin Low are super queer, super fun and ready to take over your podcast feed. Join them for provocative stories and frank conversations about the LGBTQ experience today. About the hosts: Tobin Low and Kathy Tu are the hosts of Nancy, WNYC Studios' LGBTQ-themed show about how we define ourselves and the and the journey we take to get there.

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About Us

Lee & Low Books is the largest multicultural children's book publisher in the country. We are also one of the few minority-owned publishing companies in the United States.

Founded in 1991, we have always been family-owned and independent, which means we publish what we want and aren't afraid to take risks. Our books have won major awards including the Coretta Scott King Award, the Pura Belpré Award, the NAACP Image Award, and many more.

Lee & Low Books is committed to publishing diverse books that are about everyone, for everyone. We are dedicated to cultural authenticity, and we make a special effort to work with new authors and illustrators of color.

We publish multicultural children's books for every age, including leveled books for beginning readers, picture books, early chapter books, middle grade, and young adult books. We also publish a wide selection of bilingual and Spanish language books.

Visit our testimonials page to see some of the people and organizations who support our work!

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Lee & Low Books is the largest multicultural children's book publisher in the United States. We are your diversity source.

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Books for Kids | Cinco Puntos Press | Independent Book Publisher

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With roots on the U.S./Mexico border, Cinco Puntos publishes great books which make a difference in the way you see the world.

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Publisher and reviewer of books about Native Americans, particularly those aimed at schoolchildren.

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A Broken Flute: The Native Experience in Books for Children 

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A Broken Flute: The Native Experience in Books for Children 

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A Broken Flute: The Native Experience in Books for Children

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Publisher and reviewer of books about Native Americans, particularly those aimed at schoolchildren.

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A key ingredient in building culture of peace is education. The young of today deserve a radically different education - one that does not glorify war but educates for peace, non-violence and international cooperation.
- Ambassador A. K. Chowdhury, Former UN Under-Secretary-General & High Representative and former head of UNICEF
Peace Day provides a powerful and inspiring opportunity to engage children and youth in diverse activities related to peace, unity and making a positive difference in their world. Meaningful involvement can help set a tone of respect and unity early in the academic year.
PEACE DAY ACTIVITY IDEAS (PDFs) - WHAT STUDENTS CAN DO:
FOR MORE PEACE DAY IDEAS AND RESOURCES, GO TO OTHER PAGES IN THIS SECTION (Arts, Sports, Nonviolence, Social Justice, The Environment, etc.)
CHICAGO Public Schools have been involved in Peace Day since 2008! Read the 2014 LETTER OF SUPPORT from Chicago's Peace Day initiative, Build the Peace, and CLICK HERE to l ook at CHICAGO PUBLIC SCHOOL Peace Day activities.

PEACE EDUCATION ACTIVITIES, CURRICULA AND RESOURCES

Advancement Project's Restorative Justice Toolkit for Educators
This toolkit is intended for all educators who support the growth and health of students in schools. It is an introduction for those new to the concepts and will help support and enhance the work of teachers already implementing these practices in their classrooms.

Anti-Defamation League - Resources Related to Bullying and other topics
Includes anti-bullying and anti-cyberbullying training, curriculum and resources for youth, educators, youth providers and adult family members.

Global Oneness Project Educational Resources A compilation of curriculum links and resources.

Hague Appeal for Peace: YOUTH AGENDA FOR PEACE AND JUSTICE (Includes peace education resources and peace activity ideas)

Metta Center for Nonviolence: ROADMAP - a way of making the movement of movements visual.

National Education Association- Classroom Resources Re: Martin Luther King, Jr. Lessons for K-12 related to Martin Luther King, Jr., non-violence and civil rights, as well as MLK related videos.

National Liberty Museum (Philadelphia)- Resources for Educators and Students Offers Professional Learning Experiences that present real solutions to common educational challenges. The NLM also offers in partnership with educators in youth leadership and character education through the "Young Heroes" program.

National Peace Academy - Learn about the 5 Spheres of Peace

Oxfam - Global Citizen Resources for Educators

Peace Alliance - Teach Peace

The Peace Center - Resource Library

Peace First Curriculum - Peace First provides educators with the critical skills and knowledge to integrate social-emotional learning into the school's curriculum and culture-beginning with the classroom and extending into the whole school. Also view the Peacemaker Youth Project Guide.

Peace One Day's FREE Education Resources Grades 1-12, developed with Scholastic

Peace Praxis - RESOURCES - Peace Praxis provides Philly area training in: Bullying Prevention, Behavior Management, Character Education, Conflict Resolution, Diversity Awareness, Peace Education, Peer Mediation, Social and Emotional Learning, and School Climate Improvement Planning, and more.

Peaceful Schools International - Educational Resources - Offers many different types of resources for schools, students, and parents, such as films, books, teaching guides and toolkits.
Also from PSI: Creating a Culture of Peace - A Practical Guide for Schools

Pulitzer Center - Education Resources - PC's Lesson Builder is a quick, easy and flexible way to create curriculum, using Pulitzer Center reporting.

Rock Your World - A free, multidimensional, project-based curriculum for middle and high school students. Rock Your World centers around teaching students about human rights, and then giving them time to explore a variety of issues until they identify one that 'sparks' or inspires them to action.

Roots and Shoots Program (Dr. Jane Goodall)- Resources for Educators
Dr. Goodall, a UN Messenger of Peace, offers a program through Roots and Shoots to encourage youth "of all ages" to make positive change happen―for the animal community, the human community, and for the environment.
Roots and Wings - Mindfulness Training
- an effective, simple, and universal program for reducing stress. O ne of the organization's lead programs in its Culture of Peace Education Program (CPEP). In partnership with United Nations Peace Messenger Organization Pathways To Peace, 7 Floors to Balance® fulfills a mutual and deep global calling to empower children and adults with practical, instant and easy tools to achieve peace on demand. For more info, CLICK HERE.

Southern Poverty Law Center Project - Teaching Tolerance
Includes printer friendly educational resources, and training information. For FILM KIT, free to educators, CLICK HERE

"Teach for Peace" - List/links for Curricula and Resources - Also see Teaching for a Peaceful Future Think, Care Act BLOG

Teaching for Change
Teaching for Change provides teachers and parents with the tools to create schools where students learn to read, write and change the world. Encourages teachers and students to question and re-think the world inside and outside their classrooms, build a more equitable, multicultural society, and become active global citizens.

UNESCO - Culture of Peace Classroom

U.S. Institute of Peace, Global Peacebuilding Center
Educator Resources / Tools for Students

Violence Prevention Works - Olweus Bullying Prevention Program

PEACE IN THE SCHOOLS SPOTLIGHT: MINDFULNESS

Video: Mindfulness in Schools

- FREE Film (41 Mins)- - - - - - - "Healthy Habits of the Mind" - Integrating Mindfulness Into Education - Describes why mindfulness belongs in education, and covers neuroscience, educator training, and showing mindfulness implemented in the classroom.
- "ROOM TO BREATHE" Documentary - Mindfulness for Students -
Teaching Mindfulness Skills to Kids
Mindfulness Exercises for Youth - Mindful Schools
Why Children Need Mindfulness Just as much as Adults
Ohio Representative Jim Ryan Brings Mindfulness to Ohio Public Schools
Research: Mindfulness in Schools
Greater Good - Research Round-Up
Mindfulness, with Yoga, in schools makes good economic sense - Forbes, 2013

FEATURED VIDEOS

LOCAL : Gun violence in Philadelphia produced by the Philadelphia Youth Solutions Project at St. Joseph's University

UNITED NATIONS: UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's opening comments to hundreds of youth at the annual student observance of the International Day of Peace on September 21 at the United Nations, CLICK HERE.

To watch the Briefing for the Student Observance, including UN Messengers of Peace Jane Goodall and Michael Douglas as well as UN Goodwill Ambassadors Monique Coleman and Forest Whitaker, CLICK HERE.

PARENT/YOUTH ENGAGEMENT AND SUPPORT
Campaign for Non-Violent Schools Global Citizen/MLK365 Good Shepherd Mediation Program Mothers In Charge
Need In Deed - Youth Engagement in their schools and communities
Philadelphia Youth Commission Mayor's Office of Education, Philadelphia
Students in Action/Jefferson Awards

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES/ARTICLES FOR EDUCATORS

Bullying Awareness Guidebook - Accredited Schools On-Line

Children's Hospital of Philadelphia - Violence Prevention Tools
Interfaith Center of Greater Philadelphia - Walking the Walk Youth Initiative Peaceful Warrior-Rethinking Schools School Violence: Prevention - Center for Disease Control Stomp Out Bullying: Why Do Kids Bully US Department of Health and Human Services: Best Practices In Bullying Prevention Violence Prevention Program Helps Philly School

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A key ingredient in building culture of peace is education. The young of today deserve a radically different education - one that does not glorify war but educates for peace, non-violence and international cooperation. - Ambassador A. K.

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Peacebuilding Cornerstone:
Bringing into our schools conflict resolution curricula with tools such as social & emotional learning, communication techniques, restorative processes, mindfulness, and other proven peacebuilding skills to increase graduation rates and transform violence, bullying, truancy, and other challenges facing youth...

Statistical Spotlight:

Up to 42% reduction in physical and verbal youth violence through Life Skills Training in schools.

In West Philadelphia High School, within two years of implementing a Restorative Discipline program, incidents of assault and disorderly conduct dropped more than 65%.

Schools are our main social avenue of learning. While the primary focus of teaching in schools is predominantly on academic skills, we feel that life skills are equally important. We face conflict and sometimes violence at almost every stage and in every area of our lives. In fact, conflict that is not dealt with effectively can be one of the biggest detriments to success both in school as well as in life. Youth are the foundation of our future and often can serve as transformed mentors to their friends and family, passing on good practical behaviors and communication technologies.

We would like to see basic social and emotional learning, or conflict resolution education, woven into our basic school curriculum. While proven and effective programs and curriculum are happening in pockets all over our nation, we want to see them more systemically embedded. Our policies at the local, state and federal levels have the potential to better reflect and empower these options.

Empowering Strategies and Programs, Proven Efficacy:

Communication Skills: Conflict Resolution Education Curriculum is a key modality. Teachers, staff and administrators are trained to integrate conflict resolution and management as a life skill into existing curricula and to facilitate positive change within the school community by aligning school mission statements, disciplinary procedures, and team-building efforts with conflict resolution concepts and theories.

Quick Sign-up:

"I want to be a part of this! Keep me updated"

Social and Emotional Learning: Teaches self awareness, empathy, impulse control, motivation and social skills. Social and emotional learning is the process through which children (and adults) acquire and effectively apply the knowledge, attitudes and skills necessary to understand and manage emotions, set and achieve positive goals, feel and show empathy for others, establish and maintain positive relationships, and make responsible decisions. SEL programming is based on the understanding that the best learning emerges in the context of supportive relationships that make learning challenging, engaging and meaningful.

Restorative Circles & Dialogues: This works well right from the start. Children of elementary age start the day in a circle with their teacher. Everyone gets to see each other and do a check-in. In this way, there is space for young ones to share what is happening in their lives. Perhaps a death in the family, a birth, someone in the hospital, divorce... despite the trauma, kids are expected to "behave" and appear normal. Modeling depth is always a good thing and that's where a teacher willing to be vulnerable is helpful.

Restorative Justice with trained facilitator: This is when an offense has taken place on school grounds involving one or more persons. All parties impacted by that situation come together and each is pre-interviewed. It is essential that the "offender" is willing to take responsibility and make things better. Victims must agree as well. Both victim and offender are invited to bring support people with them.

Mindfulness/Meditation: Mindfulness is a simple but powerful technique to focus attention, manage emotions, handle stress, and resolve conflicts. This allows youth to make wiser decisions in the heat of the moment, rather than only in retrospect - and can provide a much more positive school environment.

Peer Mediation: This is Peer-to-Peer mediation and does not involve teachers or adults.

Nonviolent Communication

Bullying cessation programs

Quality after-school and out-of-school programming

Teaching children about peace and peacebuilding movements, what kind of work is happening around the world, what needs to happen, etc.

Better school discipline and empowering alternatives to in-school suspension

Include areas above in Common Core guidelines and funding

Include areas above in state and local school policies and funding

Academic, Social and Emotional Learning Act, (H.R.850) in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Include Restorative Justice and other related programs in U.S. Dept. of Education disciplinary guidelines.

Implement universal, school-based violence prevention at all schools, particularly in neighborhoods highly impacted by violence

Key Statistics: Challenges and Solutions

Meditation/mindfulness practices in schools have noticeable benefits - studies have shown suspensions decrease by 79 percent, attendance increases by over 98% and academic performance is noticeably increased. [NBC News, Jan. 1, 2015 http://www.nbcnews.com/nightly-news/san-francisco-schools-transformed-power-meditation-n276301]

According to a recent report on the economic benefit of evidence-based prevention programs, the Botvin LifeSkills Training (LST) program produced a $50 benefit for every $1 invested in terms of reduced corrections costs, welfare and social services burden, drug and mental health treatment; and increased employment and tax revenue. [Return on investment: Evidence-based options to improve statewide outcomes. October 2013 (Printed on 3-20-14). Olympia: Washington State Institute for Public Policy.]

Bullied victims are between 2 to 9 times more likely to consider suicide than non-victims, according to studies by Yale University. Suicide is the third leading cause of death among young people, resulting in about 4,400 deaths per year, according to the CDC. For every suicide among young people, there are at least 100 suicide attempts. Over 14 percent of high school students have considered suicide, and almost 7 percent have attempted it. [Int J Adolesc Med Health 20 (2), 2008]

Nearly 1 in 3 students (27.8%) report being bullied during the school year. [National Center for Educational Statistics, 2013]

64 percent of children who were bullied did not report it; only 36 percent reported the bullying. [Petrosina, Guckenburg, DeVoe, and Hanson, 2010]

A 2011 analysis of 213 [ Social and Emotional Learning programs involving 270,034 kindergarten through high school students published in the journal Child Development found that the participants demonstrated significantly improved social and emotional skills, attitudes and behavior compared with a control group, as well as an 11-point gain in academic achievement percentiles. Child Development, January/February 2011, Volume 82, Number 1, Pages 405-432]

Restorative Justice programs in a West Oakland Middle School pilot project eliminated violent fights and expulsions, and reduced suspension rates by more than 75%. [Restorative Justice for Oakland Youth http://rjoyoakland.org/programs/]

[ Mindfulness or Quiet Time practices in schools have shown to bring about a 40% reduction in psychological distress, including stress, anxiety and depression American Journal of Hypertension 22(12): 1326-1331, 2009]

High schools in Ohio with conflict management programs (Conflict Resolution Education Curriculum) reported that physical violence decreased as much as 43%. The annual cost per student to administer the school conflict management grant training program is approximately $12.00. When compared to the per student cost of suspending a child ($231.00) or expelling a student ($431.00), the program has been cost effective.

Organizations & Links:
The groups are listed here for educational purposes only. Listing them here is not meant to imply that they endorse the above ideas.

Mindful Schools:
They offer online training courses for adults to learn mindfulness and use it with youth. Mindfulness is a simple but powerful technique to focus attention, manage emotions, handle stress, and resolve conflicts. This allows youth to make wiser decisions in the heat of the moment, rather than only in retrospect. Their mindfulness curriculum brings improvements in concentration, attention, and empathy, while building a climate of calm in the classroom. Click here to see an informative film.

Challenge Day's mission is to provide youth and their communities with experiential workshops and programs that demonstrate the possibility of love and connection through the celebration of diversity, truth and full expression.Great Video:

River Phoenix Center for Peacebuilding:
A local organization in Gainesville, Florida, is empowering their community to prevent, reduce, and heal from violence in all forms. They facilitate dialogues, workshops and trainings specifically geared towards fostering better communication and conflict resolution tools for individuals, law enforcement, schools and families.Great video:

Practice Guide: Emerging Practices in Design, Monitoring, and Evaluation for Education for Peacebuilding Programming
This .pdf was created by Search for Common Ground. This guide is designed to help identify how best to design education for peacebuilding programming. It also serves to capture and assess its potential impact and contribution to sustainable, transformative change.

Conflict Resolution Education - Resources for Educators:
People around the globe have started embracing conflict resolution as a key component of a quality education. You can use this site to explore some of the wide array of available materials that support conflict resolution education).

Restorative Justice for Oakland Youth:
Disparately impacting youth of color, punitive school discipline and juvenile justice policies activate tragic cycles of youth violence, incarceration, and wasted lives. Founded in 2005, RJOY works to interrupt these cycles by promoting institutional shifts toward restorative approaches that actively engage families, communities, and systems to repair harm and prevent re-offending.

CASEL - Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning:
CASEL's mission is to help make evidence-based social and emotional learning (SEL) an integral part of education from preschool through high school. Through research, practice and policy, CASEL collaborates to ensure all students become knowledgeable, responsible, caring and contributing members of society.

United States Institute of Peace Global Peacebuilding Center's Peacebuilding Toolkit for Educators:
This Peacebuilding Toolkit for Educators is designed to support the work of educators as peacebuilders. It is a resource developed by and for educators, to enable you to help introduce peacebuilding themes and skills into the classroom.

Botvin LifeSkills Training (LST) is a research-validated prevention program proven to reduce the risks of alcohol, tobacco, drug abuse, and violence by targeting the major social and psychological factors that promote the initiation of substance use and other risky behaviors. This comprehensive and exciting program provides adolescents and young teens with the confidence and skills necessary to successfully handle challenging situations.

Peer Mediation Curricula:
An extensive collection of peer mediation training resources for those who seek to help youth more constructively engage peer conflicts. The Peer Mediators curriculum combines common program and training objectives from over a dozen peer mediation curricula and draws upon various standards and best practices guidelines from the realms of youth development, peer mediation, and conflict resolution.

Playworks:
Playworks creates a place for every kid on the playground. It doesn't matter if children have never learned or played games before. They work to ensure kids have a place that is safe and welcoming - where they can play, thrive and contribute. Their goal is that every child takes this positive experience back to the classroom and back to their communities.

They teach students, educators, and parents simple, daily mindfulness practices that build awareness and concentration, Social Emotional Learning, compassion, and creativity.
More to come...
Become a partner in Be the Movement. Sign the declaration!

"I commit to being a part of Be the Movement. I will invest time, energy and/or coin, at whatever level I'm able, to building upon one or more of these five cornerstones making them a core part of the foundation of our society."

* Peacebuilding is a broad field that covers a wide spectrum of approaches beyond what we focus on in these five cornerstones. Our focus is primarily on those tools that directly improve the basic ways we relate and communicate with one another - enhancing greater cooperation. We advocate for policies, legislation and systems needed to move the work of peacebuilding forward. We welcome the work of all peace advocates and diverse peacebuilding organizations. Our hope is to align our intentions and collective peacebuilding actions for a brighter future.

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Teaching Peace in Schools Cornerstone: Be the Movement!

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Peacebuilding Cornerstone: Bringing into our schools conflict resolution curricula with tools such as social & emotional learning, communication techniques, restorative processes, mindfulness, and other proven peacebuilding skills to increase graduation rates and transform violence, bullying, truancy, and other challenges facing youth... Statistical Spotlight: Up to 42% reduction in physical and verbal youth violence through Life Skills Training in schools.

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Workshops

In many ways, the racial injustice being highlighted at this time in history is not new. What IS new is the way racial justice is now being covered by the mainstream media and discussed in just about every forum. Students are looking to their teachers to help navigate and make sense of what they are seeing. In our workshops, we help educators develop the knowledge and skills to support students in this process - and to work with colleagues in developing inclusive, antiracist curricula and school communities.

Some of our newest workshops include:

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In many ways, the racial injustice being highlighted at this time in history is not new. What IS new is the way racial justice is now being covered by the mainstream media and discussed in just about every forum. Students are looking to their teachers to help navigate and make sense of what they are seeing.

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How am I supposed to confront white supremacy and racism on the first day of school? by Jessica Lifshitz

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How am I supposed to confront white supremacy and racism on the first day of school? by Jessica Lifshitz

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In less than one week, my new groups of 5th graders will be heading through our classroom door. I love the start of the school year. It is filled with such anticipation, mixed with anxiousness, mixed with uncertainty, mixed with excitement. I love the possibility of a new school year, I love the way we, as a new classroom community, start to try to figure each other out as soon as we walk through the door. I love the way that we reach out, form connections and start to figure out the kind of classroom that we are going to be.

It is one of my favorite times of year.

And yet. This year. I am entering into the school year with a heavy heart. This world of ours. The ways we have failed to fix it and the ways we continue to mess it up. It is all weighing so heavily on so many of us. And it is my own privilege that has previously kept these feelings from me and it is my own privilege that makes this current state of being feel like something new, when, in fact, it is something as old as the country I call my home.

Like many other educators, I have promised to do better. I have spent time reading and educating myself and trying to figure out how I can discuss this world with my students. I have spent time trying to figure out how I can teach in a way that does not just promote kindness, but that actively works to dismantle the racist structures and systems that school has continued to promote for so long.

Because we have so much work to do. And, to be honest, there is no one that I would rather be engaged in this work with than a new group of kids. Kids give me so much hope because they are so willing to identify the things that are wrong and they are even more willing to look for ways to make those things right, or at least a bit more right. They are willing to engage in difficult conversations. They are willing to make themselves vulnerable. They are willing to admit they do not know it all. They are willing to struggle with difficult concepts in an attempt to understand the injustices that we can help them to see. In short, they give me hope. So I am looking forward to getting back to my students, because I know that they will be willing to join in me in this work.

And this work. It is on so many of our minds as we head back into the new school year. I have never heard so many educators engaged in so many conversations about race and racism and bias and identity. It is horrific that it has taken us this long, but I find myself now standing with more educators ready to do better than ever before.

And yet. There is a lot of uncertainty here. A lot of white educators, we have a lot to catch up on. We are woefully behind and ignorant on the very things that we now know that we need to help our students to understand. And that is a very uncomfortable feeling. Not as uncomfortable, might I add, as those who have been living and breathing and struggling with the consequences of white supremacy and racism for their entire lives, but for those of us whose privilege has kept us at a comfortable distance from discomfort, we are having a hard time adjusting. And sometimes that adjustment, it forces us to turn away. It pushes us back towards silence. Towards complacency.

But if we really mean what we say, if we really promise to do better and commit to social justice, then we have to find a way to lean into the discomfort and move forward. And do better.

But as we wrestle with these issues, we also find ourselves at the start of a new school year. For all of us, there is always an uncertainty about what has happened in our students lives over the summer. And this year, even more so. We do not know what our students will walk into our rooms knowing or not knowing. We do not know what our students will walk into our room having experienced personally or alongside their families. There is so much we do not yet know about our new students.

And so many of us are left asking: "How am I supposed to confront white supremacy and racism on the first day of school?"

This is the question that has been plaguing me for many nights and I have come to this space to try to make some sense of it all.

Here is where I land. We might not be ready to confront white supremacy and racism head on during the first week of school. But that does not mean that we do nothing. What we must do, instead, is start to build the foundation that will allow us to do that work in the days and weeks and months to come. And here are some ways that I hope to do that.

On the first day of the school year, I want my students to walk into our classroom for the very first time and feel a sense of calm. A shelter from this storm of a world that we have made for them. I want every single child to feel safe and to know that he or she or they belong here. If I were to ask my fifth grade students, on day one, to engage in conversations about racism and white supremacy, I would not be giving them a fair chance. Things would probably go poorly. There would be misunderstandings and hurt feelings and someone would probably walk away scared for the year to come.

Now let me be clear, this does NOT mean that I do not believe these conversations should be taking place in fifth grade. They should. And ultimately, in our classroom, they will.

But what I am trying to say is that we cannot expect to change the world on the first day of the school year. We cannot ask our students to have courageous conversations before we have made them feel as if this is a safe place to do so.

So what can we do? Where can we start? What can we do in our first minutes, hours and days of the school year that will allow us to create a place where we can confront white supremacy and racism with our students?

Here are some of things that have felt important to me:

From the minute my students walk through the door, I want to show them that the stories of white people are not the only stories valued, given worth and made visible in our classroom. To do this, every picture book that I read in the first week of school will have a person of color as a main character. This does NOT mean that I will only be reading books ABOUT race, this means that I will no longer allow the stories of white people and white characters to be the ones that my students see the most. We will read books like Jabari Jumps and One Word From Sophia and Come On, Rain and Mr. Lincoln's Way. We will look at stories from the website Human of New York and we will look at stories that come from Iraq and Pakistan and Sudan and Brazil and Uganda. We will see that there are humans all over this world, some look like we do, some don't, some live like we do, and some don't, but we all have stories and those stories all have value and worth and in our classroom we will broaden our understanding of the world by valuing all stories.

From the minute my students walk through the door, I want them to know that they are loved and accepted for exactly who they are. Because this much I know, children who know what it is like to be loved for who they are, have a much easier time loving others for exactly who they are. I will work hard to ensure that students' various needs and wants are heard and I will do my best to meet those needs and wants. I will do this by asking for their input from the very first day. They will have choice in what they sit on or in, they will have choice in who they sit by, they will choice in how our first day will unfold. I do not pretend that allowing kids to choose where they will solve the problems of this world, but letting kids know that I understand they are all different and unique individuals will start to convince them that I see them for who they are and that who they are is loved and accepted here.

From the minute my students walk through the door, I want them to know that I will work to get to KNOW who they are instead of making ASSUMPTIONS about who they are. Because this will model for them the way that they can work to overcome their own biases and assumptions by listening for and accepting as truth the stories that other people tell about themselves. I will ask questions about their lives outside of school, about their families, about their traditions and about their homes instead of assuming that these are things that I already understand. I will also make sure to listen, very carefully, as they start to tell me about their lives. I will listen, very carefully, as they pronounce their names. First names and last names. And I will ask them to repeat their names, first names and last names, so that I am certain that I am saying them correctly and I will be hyper vigilant to assure that their classmates are saying them correctly as well. Because a child's name is the very first piece of their identity that they actively choose to share with me and by showing them that I value this piece of who they are enough to make sure that I get it right, I am modeling the importance of truly getting to know another human.

From the minute my students walk through the door, I want them to know that their voices carry power. Helping students believe that their words matter and that their thoughts and ideas matter, starts on day one and I truly believe that convincing our kids that they have things that are worth saying, helps them to learn to say much more important things. So from the first day, my students' voices will craft our classroom vision statement, and I will ask them to lend their voices by telling their own stories so that we can begin to share these stories with the world in order to help the world better understand their lives.

From the minute my students walk through the door, I want them to know that they are a part of a community. Because a student who feels connected to a community that is built on love, will be less likely to feel the need to seek out a community that is built on hate. So from the first day, I will ask my students to work together. I will ask them to make things. Together. I will not allow them to choose to make something on their own. And I will promise to not swoop in the second there is a disagreement, because I want them to know that communities can disagree AND still find ways to work together. So there will be Lego building challenges and design challenges and STEM challenges where people with different ideas will need to come together in order to make one thing. There might be tension and there might be arguing and we will start to find our way through it all. Because I want my students to know that there will be tough moments in our classroom, we will not shy away from that which might make us uncomfortable, and we will come out on the other side stronger and better.

From the minute my students walk through the door, I will share myself with them. I will share my own stories. I will tell them who I am. I will tell them about my wife and my daughter and my, many, many pets. I will also tell them about my struggles, about my strengths and the things that scare me. Because if they do not see me as human and as imperfect, then they will never be willing to share their imperfections with me. And it is in our imperfections where we have the best chance of beginning to grow.

And from the minute my students walk through the door, there will be joy. Because if we do not have a foundation of joy in our classroom, then it will be hard to tackle the harder stuff. If we cannot stand on joy, then it will be harder for us to understand our responsibility to fight for those who have too many barriers to joy. Standing on the strength of our shared joy, we will be better able to tackle the things that are devoid of joy, the things that keep us awake at night, the things that cause us to doubt our own sense of hope.

And none of these things, by themselves, are particularly revolutionary. But what they create is a strong foundation. A foundation that will support us through the difficult work that we are going to do this year. Because as so many others have said, and much more intelligently than me, we have some very difficult work to do this year. And we are going to need to do it together and trust in each other and make ourselves vulnerable in front of each other and maybe we are not ready to do on day one, but the things that we are ready to do on day one will set the tone for the year and prepare us for what will come.

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How am I supposed to confront white supremacy and racism on the first day of school?

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In less than one week, my new groups of 5th graders will be heading through our classroom door. I love the start of the school year. It is filled with such anticipation, mixed with anxiousness, mixed with uncertainty, mixed with excitement. I love the possibility of a new school year, I love the way we,...

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The Work of Back to School by Chad Everett

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The Work of Back to School by Chad Everett

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'Twas the week before school and all through the building the teachers were scurrying, checking to see if the floors had been waxed. The decorations were hung on the doors and walls with care, in preparation for the students who would soon be there. . .

It's hard to believe the beginning of a new school year is two days away for me. I am always excited to see all of the posts on social media of my friends and colleagues working hard to paint walls, decorate doors, and ensure the tables are positioned just right. I also stand in awe of those who are blessed with design skills that I will likely never possess (HGTV won't be calling anytime soon). I wonder, though, if we work on ourselves as much as we work on our classrooms? I don't mean do we sit through 10 hours of PD on reading instruction so that we can become better reading teachers, although that is necessary and important.

What I mean is how much time have we dedicated to doing the internal work required to become better educators? We can write the most brilliant syllabus ever, but if we see families as impediments, needing only to come when we call, not as partners, the syllabus won't matter.

If our paint scheme is more warm and welcoming than our attitude towards students, having flawless walls won't matter.

Do we spend as much time thinking about our disciplinary practices as we do making behavior charts? Have we spent time working to mitigate our own biases so that we do not become active agents in the disproportionate discipline of black and brown students? (Side note: I encourage you to do some research on the effectiveness of public behavior charts before you hang yours).

We plan activities to get to know our students in authentic ways, but do we have a plan to ensure they get to be their authentic selves in our classrooms?

We can spend hours unpacking the standards in our curriculum binders, but if we ignore the curriculum the world is handing us each day, we will have failed our students, regardless of if they pass the end-of-year standardized tests.

A paint scheme or flexible seating won't change a student's life, but a teacher who is committed to respect and creating an equitable environment will.

Know this: your classroom does not have to look like it's pulled from a Pinterest board to make you an effective teacher. You are enough. You don't have to teach like a pirate, like a champion, or like your hair is on fire to be enough. You do have to commit to showing up for 180 days and doing the work-the work that is not always visible, the work you may never be recognized for doing, the work that is the foundation of all the other work.

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'Twas the week before school and all through the building the teachers were scurrying, checking to see if the floors had been waxed. The decorations were hung on the doors and walls with care, in preparation for the students who would soon be there. . .

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How Schools Can Navigate Racism in Children's Books 

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How Schools Can Navigate Racism in Children's Books 

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A children's-literature scholar argues it's time to acknowledge the perturbing themes in some of the most beloved books.

Mike Blake / Reuters

Fattal: Is learning to engage with discomfort harder for children than it is in a classroom of college students? How might educators navigate that difficulty?

Nel: Children notice race from when they're very young. Children of color have to face it head-on. But I just got a note from a friend of mine who was talking about her 5-year-old who was worried when she was getting tan that she might turn black. And that worried her, because [the 5-year-old] knows what black means. She knows that puts you at a disadvantage based on this country's laws and values. And her mother explained, and had the uncomfortable conversation of indicating, "Well that's not how race works, but also ... black is beautiful, and we have black friends who are beautiful." Kids get it. I think the failure to have that conversation is an abdication of responsibility on the part of parents and educators.

Fattal: You talk in the book about showing children that anger can be channeled toward productive action. Are kids really capable of this move from anger or discomfort to action, and how might educators facilitate that?

Nel: The emotional experience of dealing with racism is tough, especially if you're the target. I think what's worse, though, is not dealing with it and not being given any tools for dealing with it-to experience the injury and then not know how to deal with it. I think if a teacher is able to talk to a child and say, "it's okay not to like a book or to be angry at the author or to be angry at a text; this is infuriating in the way that it's presenting this Native American character or this character of Asian descent, and I see why you'd be angry at it." I think that's actually really healthy, because it lets the child direct the anger at the appropriate target rather than internally, or rather than just kind of stewing over it.

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Educators can also ask students, "what should we do?" "Should we take it off the curriculum?" "Is it helpful to have a conversation about it?" "Should we contact the publisher?" The emotional interest can translate to political interest, if you give those emotions an outlet, first for being expressed, and then secondly to say, "right, I'm with you, let's do something"-to ask, "what can we do? Because this is upsetting." That shows children they have agency, they have power, they have a voice. That's so important. Adults like to think of children as innocent, as uncorrupted by this corrupt world, but that's not actually how life works. As soon as you enter this world you begin to be affected by it. You need to talk about it. You need to help children become better adults than the ones they're interacting with.

Fattal: How might a classroom discussion change on the basis of age and reading levels?

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How Schools Can Navigate the Hidden Racism in Children's Literature

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A children's-literature scholar argues it's time to acknowledge the perturbing themes in some of the most beloved books. Fattal: Is learning to engage with discomfort harder for children than it is in a classroom of college students? How might educators navigate that difficulty? Nel: Children notice race from when they're very young.

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Ok, let's talk about Dr. Seuss by Grace Lin 

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Ok, let's talk about Dr. Seuss by Grace Lin 

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So, I've been avoiding the whole Dr. Seuss debacle , as I know the authors involved and I imagine (especially after vicious trolling myself), they probably just want the issue to die away. But the story keeps getting bigger, and recently someone on a friend's Facebook page said how he thought Mo Willems was being a hypocrite for accepting the Theodor Geisel Award from the American Library Association, yet boycotting the museum event.

Lord know, Mo Willems doesn't need me to defend him, but here's the thing. I received the Theodor Geisel Honor as well and I, too, would've boycotted the museum event. And I don't think it's hypocritical.

So, let's do some background. Theodor Geisel is Dr. Seuss. All children's book creators worth their salt know the history of the industry's greats and almost all of us know Dr. Seuss. So, while most of the mass public doesn't realize this, we know that Dr. Seuss's early career is filled with creations of racist propaganda. He drew horrible stereotypes against Jews, African-Americans--you name it. One of his most egregious cartoons depicted Japanese Americans lining up to receive bombs.

But it was 1942, a time where anti-Asian paranoia was at in full tilt. Geisel was a product of his time, simply reflecting what people were feeling.

However, as time passed, Geisel began to regret his earlier images. It is widely accepted that his beloved book, "Horton Hears a Who!" was his way of apologizing for his earlier art. He went on to write books like "The Sneetches," stories with themes of inclusion and tolerance.

And that is what makes Geisel a great man and artist. Because he was willing to grow from his original mindset, realize the harm the his work could do and get better. That is why he is an artist I am honored to receive an award with his namesake on and why he deserves a museum.

Now, for the museum controversy. The image that is displayed is from Geisel's first book, "And to Think I Saw it on Mulberry Street" printed in 1937, the same time Geisel was doing his racist cartoons. "The Chinaman" image that is being debated initially had the character bright yellow and with a long pigtail. In 1978, acknowledging that the image could be offensive, Geisel himself changed it so that the character is white and without a pigtail.*

It is now 2017. Even with the character being white and without a pigtail, a great many people (myself included) wince at the caricature. My first reaction is, "Do we really need to see that now? Of all the images of this man's work, do we really need to show this one?"

And, in a Seuss museum, the answer could be yes. However, the answer is only yes if the image is put in context. Viewers need to know, and honestly Geisel himself deserves, an explanation. They need to know Geisel's history with his own art and with this particular image. To display it without context (which, I daresay is a museum's job) reduces the image to mere decoration. And, to many (myself included) an offensive decoration**.

I was not asked to participate in the museum's event, but I cannot fathom trying to read my books in front of the Chinaman caricature presented as it is now. To do an event with this image right behind me, without acknowledging its racism and Geisel's journey away from it, would be pretty insulting. I would have declined to have participate. Just like Mo Willems.

Yet, I proudly display the sticker Geisel's image on my book.

What is the difference? It's different to me, because when you accept the award it is a picture of Theodor Geisel on the medal; not any of his past racist art--the medal and award is symbolic of him as a whole person. The ceremony is with educated, adult librarians, whom I assume know or should know the history of the him.

The Seuss museum and the event there is for kids and adult who are not aware of Geisel's history. They are at the museum to learn about him and the museum refuses to teach this part of his past. Instead they just show the racist image as decoration. I would not accept the invitation because they are allowing the racist image to stand as a racist image instead of showing it as a part of Geisel's regrettable past.

I honor the Theodor Geisel as a man who outgrew his racism and created some of the best books of children's literature of all time. And without an explanation, I abhor the single image that is displayed.

Which is why I don't think Mo Willems is a hypocrite. And I don't think I am one either.

*Which leaves me with this question--now, forty years later, if Geisel was still alive--don't you think it would be a possibility that he would change it again? If he was willing to do it once because time had changed his mind, what do you think another forty years would do?
**Is this image offensive? Let's break down a couple responses to this question.
Response #1: "I loved this book, and I'm fine!" (sometimes with the additional, "and I'm Asian!")
Okay, that is great for you. I'm happy you are fine and it didn't bother you. But your response is like, "My car didn't have a seatbelt, and I'm fine." There are lots of people who images like this hurt, trust me. I am one of them and I have bunch of readers who will say the same. Maybe you weren't teased that your eyes were so small that dental floss could blindfold you, but that doesn't mean I wasn't. Can you at least acknowledge that it is offensive to some people and for good reason?
Response #2: "This is history! How dare you try to erase it!" You are mixing up nostalgia for history. No one asked for the mural to be removed, the museum decided to that themselves because they were unwilling to put the art in context---think about that. The museum could not bring themselves to put a caption the length of a tweet next the image. Why aren't you offended by that? Isn't a museum's job to educate and put things in context for the viewer? The artists in question here asked for the art to be put in context. If anything, the artists were trying to give a more accurate view of history.
p.s. I've disabled comments for my blog because I am tired of trolls.

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So, I've been avoiding the whole Dr. Seuss debacle , as I know the authors involved and I imagine (especially after vicious trolling myself), they probably just want the issue to die away.

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Children's books are the most important books to take seriously, as they tell children whose stories are worth telling and whose stories are not," says American academic and children's literature expert Philip Nel. "They're the most important books we read."

This is why the distinguished professor in the department of English at Kansas State University thinks his latest book should be required reading for teachers. The premise of Was the Cat in the Hat Black?: the hidden racism of children's literature, and the need for diverse books is clear from its title, and Nel believes even many of our best-loved children's classics may be transmitting a certain amount of insidious racism to their young readers. Educators and parents have a duty to tackle this, he says.

Spotting the problem material can, he admits, be difficult.

"Racism isn't always obvious in children's literature because attempts to clean up classics - like Doctor Dolittle, or Huckleberry Finn - simply re-encode the original's racism in more subtle ways," he explains.

But then, he says, there are books like Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. "Dahl's vision of happily enslaved Oompa-Loompas conveys the idea that some types of people are happier in subservient roles. In the original 1964 version, they were not small white people from Loompaland," he explains. "They were African pygmies. Changing their colour in the 1973 [revised] version makes the racism less obvious, but does not erase it. They are still 'a tribe' who are delighted to be shipped to England in packing cases, and who find life in a factory - where they are literally paid beans - preferable to life in the 'thick jungles' of their native land."

Highlighting these problematic features of much-loved books has not always made Nel popular. Some dismiss the importance of his work, he reveals.

"People's affection for favourites of their youth can prevent them from asking critical questions about the books," he explains. "And, of course, some people consider children's literature insufficiently important to take seriously."

Misguided views

The latter is a very misguided view, he says: "What we learn as children shapes our world view profoundly because when we are small we are still in the process of figuring out who we are and what we believe. For this reason, children's books are some of the most important influences on who we become - and on what biases we harbour or don't harbour."

It's certainly impossible to view Willy Wonka and his team of helpers in quite the same light after Nel's analysis, but despite powerful examples like this, some have claimed he is reading too much into some of the much-loved stories he critiques. It's a suggestion he refutes robustly.

"It is intellectually lazy to see this as 'reading too much into'," he argues. "Books are not doors through which truth or meaning simply arrives, unaided. When we read, we inevitably 'read into' - we bring our own knowledge and experience to the text, in an effort to make sense of it. 'You're reading too much into that book' is a dishonest way of saying 'You interpreted that book differently than I did.'

"Of course, not all interpretations are equal. Those that can be supported by better evidence are more persuasive. And that's the conversation to have: what evidence have we for this interpretation?"

The answer to this question, of course, varies from text to text, but Nell points to a 2015 study by the Pew Research Centre that found almost no adults are without some unconscious racial bias. So perhaps it's unsurprising that many books may also contain subconsciously racist attitudes.

And he says that this is far from being a phenomenon confined to books by long-dead authors writing from bygone ages.

"I've spoken to living authors about racism in children's literature and how to avoid it, though I have not addressed living authors' racist books directly," he explains. "I think that children's authors [of any race] should be aware that racism is not aberrant. It's ordinary. It's not unusual. It's woven into the fabric of the culture in which we live. It's impossible to grow up in a racist culture and not have its ideas affect your thinking. In other words, we need to begin by understanding that we absorb racist ideas unconsciously and are often unaware of how those ideas shape us.

"We are not born racist. We learn to be racist. Artists recycle racist imagery unconsciously, not aware that they're doing so. When child readers absorb that imagery, it infects their imaginations, too."

Avoidance 'not the answer'

Faced with this reality, should we simply avoid teaching books that may contain these racist biases? Do schools need to sweep their book shelves for hidden prejudice? Nel's answer is not as straightforward as you might expect.

"Racist texts can inflict real psychological damage on children of all races, but the child who is a member of the targeted group bears a heavier burden than the child who is not," he explains. "Indeed, one could argue that the best way to hasten the decline of a racist classic - and thus the racism it may propagate - is not to teach it at all, at any level.

"Although I respect that argument, I would suggest that ignoring the symptoms does not cure the disease. It is a less-risky choice to teach offensive books critically, helping students see the ways in which they reinforce racism and engaging in painful, but sadly necessary conversations."

In other words, avoidance is probably not the answer - and it may even do further harm if we fail to use these texts to engage, as Nel points out: "Children of colour face racism from their earliest days, so the adults in their lives do not have the choice of whether to discuss racism with them. Discussing it via the safer realm of children's books can actually prepare them to face it in the world beyond the classroom. They need to know that it's OK not to like a book or to be angry at a book."

More than this, Nel believes that drawing attention to issues of race in children's literature can help children from all perspectives grapple with these concepts.

"Such discussions can help children of colour survive in a racist world, but they can also help prevent white children from remaining oblivious to their white privilege and the structural oppression upon which it rests," he argues. "All white people are beneficiaries of white supremacy, whether we want to be or not. That's a tough lesson for children to learn, but learning it can help white children become more compassionate and become allies in the fight for justice."

But as much as teachers may wish to address these issues, it can be tricky to know where to start. How then do we best begin these conversations?

"For any book, ask children: whose view of the world is this and which kinds of behaviour are presented as normal?" says Nel. "Why is the book written from this perspective? And whose perspectives are silenced or ignored? What would happen if we rewrote the story from one of those ignored or silenced perspectives?"

Of course, it's not just about challenging racism when it does appear in children's literature. As teachers, we can help to ensure that our pupils are experiencing a range of more diverse and positive texts too and Nel believes that this needs to be a part of the strategy.

"Non-white children need to see themselves in all kinds of stories," he explains. "And white children need to see children of colour in all kinds of stories."

Branching out

If you're keen to seek out some of these stories, he even has some recommendations

(Tes also ran some suggestions online at bit.ly/TESdiversitybooks).

"For children's books that promote equality, I'm a big fan of Jim Averbeck and Yasmeen Ismail's picture book, One Word from Sophia, which is a very good example of incidental diversity - that is, the character's race is incidental to the story. The title character is also smart, funny, and determined.

"And G Willow Wilson's reboot of the Ms Marvel comics - featuring a Pakistani-American Muslim teen in the title role - is great for readers who enjoy comics and graphic novels. When it is ordinary to find non-white characters starring in dystopian novels, science fiction, comic books and fantasy, we at last have truly liberated our imaginations."

Nel offers a stark assessment of the consequences of failure to act in the ways he has laid out.

"If we do nothing to address racism, we perpetuate the problem and sustain a racist status quo," he argues. "Silence here is complicity.

"Educators can make a difference. Fighting racism at all levels of education can strengthen democracies."

The good news is that change has already begun, he says. The result is not only open discussions of racism, but also better books.

"To point to a recent - and positive - example, when critics pointed out the likely inadvertent racial caricature in the black cloud he had drawn over the title character of Lemony Snicket's The Bad Mood and the Stick, artist Matthew Forsythe re-did the illustrations and made a better book," says Nel. "Instead of a Golliwog-esque black cloud, there's now a multi-hued cloud that offers a stronger visual echo of the child whose mood it represents."
Kate Townshend is a teacher in Gloucestershire

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Children's books are the most important books to take seriously, as they tell children whose stories are worth telling and whose stories are not," says American academic and children's literature expert Philip Nel. "They're the most important books we read."

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Sue Black, Certified Bullying Prevention Trainer

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Sue Black is a Certified Bullying Prevention Trainer who brings energy, enthusiasm, and experience to her unique bullying prevention school assemblies, teacher training, parent workshops, and classroom meetings.