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[CCBC-Net] Meaning well and doing well
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From: Ginny Moore Kruse <gmkruse>
Date: Wed, 11 Oct 2006 17:06:44 -0500
As helpful as it is to have lists of fiction and nonfiction books about various disabling conditions and circumstances, it's also important to reflect upon the elements necessary to keep in mind while evaluating these books. Years ago with major assistance from content specialists I became involved in a study of such books, and the CCBC offered a workshop on the topic. Though the study and the workshop content have long been out-of-date, perhaps some of the considerations remain useful.
We were astonished to realize that books of information often included or repeated factual errors.
Terminology offered another pitfall. For example, today most informed people don't refer to "the deaf" of 'the blind," thus characterizing an entire "group" according to its perceived condition rather than according to any number of other relevant circumstances.
We noticed many stories designed to "explain" a disabling condition to young readers. There were very few novels one might evaluate or analyze as literature.
Novels involving a major or minor character with a physical limitation were more likely to be closer to something about that reality than fiction involving a character with cognitive limitations. This was mentioned by someone else during the past week, i.e., how much more difficult it is to know what that experience might be for the affected individual, hence there's a greater chance to "get it wrong."
Writers too frequently relied upon stereotypical observations rather than differentiating their fictional characters according to personality differences the way so-called "normal" characters would be developed.
Often a fictional character with a disabling condition was a "problem" for a sibling or her/his family in general, and the sibling's "problem" became the focus of the plot.
We rarely saw characters with physical or cognitive limitations in the background, but then I must admit that we rarely saw any characters of any distinctive population being "background" in any novel. Merri Lindgren referred to "invisibility" as she introduced this discussion topic, and that's another way of understanding such an absence of reality.
Just by writing with good intentions, I've run the risk of unintentionally using inaccurate terminology or making stereotypical observations without even realizing I'm doing that. I'm an example of all the writers with good intentions. As my mother might say, "she meant well." But meaning well and doing well are vastly different from each other, and that's what we're looking at right now, isn't it?
Peace, Ginny
Ginny Moore Kruse gmkruse at education.wisc.edu
Received on Wed 11 Oct 2006 05:06:44 PM CDT
Date: Wed, 11 Oct 2006 17:06:44 -0500
As helpful as it is to have lists of fiction and nonfiction books about various disabling conditions and circumstances, it's also important to reflect upon the elements necessary to keep in mind while evaluating these books. Years ago with major assistance from content specialists I became involved in a study of such books, and the CCBC offered a workshop on the topic. Though the study and the workshop content have long been out-of-date, perhaps some of the considerations remain useful.
We were astonished to realize that books of information often included or repeated factual errors.
Terminology offered another pitfall. For example, today most informed people don't refer to "the deaf" of 'the blind," thus characterizing an entire "group" according to its perceived condition rather than according to any number of other relevant circumstances.
We noticed many stories designed to "explain" a disabling condition to young readers. There were very few novels one might evaluate or analyze as literature.
Novels involving a major or minor character with a physical limitation were more likely to be closer to something about that reality than fiction involving a character with cognitive limitations. This was mentioned by someone else during the past week, i.e., how much more difficult it is to know what that experience might be for the affected individual, hence there's a greater chance to "get it wrong."
Writers too frequently relied upon stereotypical observations rather than differentiating their fictional characters according to personality differences the way so-called "normal" characters would be developed.
Often a fictional character with a disabling condition was a "problem" for a sibling or her/his family in general, and the sibling's "problem" became the focus of the plot.
We rarely saw characters with physical or cognitive limitations in the background, but then I must admit that we rarely saw any characters of any distinctive population being "background" in any novel. Merri Lindgren referred to "invisibility" as she introduced this discussion topic, and that's another way of understanding such an absence of reality.
Just by writing with good intentions, I've run the risk of unintentionally using inaccurate terminology or making stereotypical observations without even realizing I'm doing that. I'm an example of all the writers with good intentions. As my mother might say, "she meant well." But meaning well and doing well are vastly different from each other, and that's what we're looking at right now, isn't it?
Peace, Ginny
Ginny Moore Kruse gmkruse at education.wisc.edu
Received on Wed 11 Oct 2006 05:06:44 PM CDT
