Children’s literature is not neutral. It can be educational and entertaining, but books for kids also tell us something about our society and ourselves. As I wrote in my last HuffPo essay,
There’s clearly a direct link between the misrepresentation of Black youth as inherently criminal and the justification given by those who brazenly take their lives. The publishing industry can’t solve this problem, but the relative lack of children’s books by and about people of color nonetheless functions as a kind of “symbolic annihilation.” Despite the fact that the majority of school-age children in the US are now kids of color, the US publishing industry continues to produce books that overwhelmingly feature white children only. The message is clear: the lives of kids of color don’t matter.
I’m not a citizen so I can’t vote—and that stings a bit when I look at yesterday’s election results. But even if I can’t vote, I can still remain politically engaged as a writer and educator—and self-publisher. The Last Bunny in Brooklyn, my allegory about race and social dislocation, is available online now (you should be able to order it from bookstores within a week). And I’m excited to be working with this talented illustrator once more; Babs is making amazing progress on Fox & Crow: a Christmas Tale, and I hope to publish that illustrated book along with my middle grade novel, An Angel for Mariqua, next month. Mariqua’s mom is incarcerated—Black women’s rising rates of incarceration mattered to me back in 2000 when I wrote this novel, and it still matters today. Be sure to check out the Crunk Feminist Collective’s new series: Voices from Inside, which lets women in prison tell their story, their way…
For yesterday’s election, it would have mattered if you were, say, in Kentucky rather than New York City. But at this point, when money has come to matter more than votes, any work to raise the consciousness of people who can influence decision-makers and resist the lies of money-driven campaigns is the most important work we can do.
Excellent analysis, as always, Lyn!
Reblogged this on The Eclectic Kitabu Project.
Thanks, Karen!