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[CCBC-Net] September CCBC-Net Topics
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From: Sarah Park <sparkla79>
Date: Thu, 3 Sep 2009 15:26:21 -0500
Hello everyone! I'm really excited about this topic because my research area is Asian American children's literature and I'm serving on the Asian Pacific American Librarian Association's awards committee, so this topic is near and dear to my heart :)
It's exciting that the numbers of books has been increasing over the years, but I want to point out that there are sub-areas that merit closer attention. For example, there are more and more books about transracially adopted Asian children, yet in my research I've found that very few of these books are written by Asian adoptees themselves. For the Chinese adoptees this is more likely because it is a relatively recent phenomenon so the girls are just now entering college, but Korean adoption has been going on since the 1950s and in my dissertation research I found that only 1 of 51 children's and young adult books was authored by an adoptee. Mind you, this book was self-published by a 9-year old whose therapist and adoptive parents were clearly heavily involved in the writing process. On the other hand, most books I've read about being an Asian immigrant, the Korean War, Japanese colonization, etc., were written by people who either directly experienced that situation (for example, Sook Nyul Choi's *Year of Impossible Goodbyes*) or is the child of someone who did (for example, Linda Sue Park's *When My Name Was Keoko*). So when we celebrate that there are many insider authors of Asian American children's literature (thanks to the CCBC for compiling those statistics), I just want to point out that there are sub-topics for which this is not true, and this has implications for the types of stories being told and circulated, and whose voices and perspectives are being left out.
You can read a bit more about my dissertation work (and other thoughts on Asian American children's literature) here: http://readingspark.wordpress.com/2009/04/08/dissertation-abstract/
Warmly, Sarah
Sarah Park, Ph.D. Assistant Professor of LIS St. Catherine University sparkLA79 at gmail.com http://sarahpark.com 310-922-5979
On Thu, Sep 3, 2009 at 11:25 AM, Megan Schliesman < schliesman at education.wisc.edu> wrote:
> Here's what we'll be talking about this month on CCBC-Net. We invite you
> to continue to share announcments for the next day or so.
>
> *First Half September: New Asian/Pacific and Asian/Pacific American
> Children?s and Young Adult Literature. *In the past few years there?s
> been a welcome increase in the number of books reflecting Asian/Pacific
> and Asian/Pacific American experiences published for children and teens.
> (You can see the CCBC?s annual statistics on this and other dimensions
> of multicultural publishing at
> http://www.education.wisc.edu/ccbc/books/pcstats.asp ). As with all
> multicultural publishing, the numbers are always relative?it?s still a
> shockingly small percentage of publishing overall-- but it?s exciting to
> see newer writers and artists for children and teens, such as Naomi
> Hirahara, Cynthia Kadohata, Suzy Lee, Moying Li, Kashmira Sheth, Gene
> Luen Yang, Paula Yoo, and others joining veterans such as Sheila
> Hamanaka, Yumi Heo, Mitali Perkins, Allen Say, Laurence Yep. . . (the
> list goes on), in creating books that speak to some of the many and
> varied dimensions of Asian/Pacific heritage in our nation and the world.
> During the first half of September on CCBC-Net, we?ll talk about
> Asian/Pacific literature for children and teens, from individual books,
> authors and artists to the importance of having an ever-growing body of
> engaging, culturally authentic books available for children and teens.
>
> *Second Half of September: Crossover Books, Part II. *We first visited
> the topic of crossover books?titles that are marketed to both children
> and adult audiences, in June 1999. That discussion was inspired in part
> by the ever-growing popularity of ?Harry Potter ,? which was already
> having noticeable crossover appeal. Today, it seems we think about
> crossover less in terms of marketing and more in terms of how the lines
> between children?s/young adult and adult literature are not always
> easily defined, at least when it comes to appeal. From ?The Book Thief?
> to ?American Born Chinese? to ?Twilight? and beyond, we?ll revisit the
> topic of ?crossover books? in light of the past ten years of publishing
> during the second half of September.
>
>
> Megan
>
>
> --
> Megan Schliesman, Librarian
> Cooperative Children's Book Center
> School of Education, University of Wisconsin-Madison
> 600 N. Park Street, Room 4290
> Madison, WI 53706
>
> 608/262-9503
> schliesman at education.wisc.edu
>
> www.education.wisc.edu/ccbc/
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> CCBC-Net mailing list
> CCBC-Net at lists.education.wisc.edu
> Visit this link to read archives or to unsubscribe...
> http://lists.education.wisc.edu/mailman/listinfo/ccbc-net
>
Received on Thu 03 Sep 2009 03:26:21 PM CDT
Date: Thu, 3 Sep 2009 15:26:21 -0500
Hello everyone! I'm really excited about this topic because my research area is Asian American children's literature and I'm serving on the Asian Pacific American Librarian Association's awards committee, so this topic is near and dear to my heart :)
It's exciting that the numbers of books has been increasing over the years, but I want to point out that there are sub-areas that merit closer attention. For example, there are more and more books about transracially adopted Asian children, yet in my research I've found that very few of these books are written by Asian adoptees themselves. For the Chinese adoptees this is more likely because it is a relatively recent phenomenon so the girls are just now entering college, but Korean adoption has been going on since the 1950s and in my dissertation research I found that only 1 of 51 children's and young adult books was authored by an adoptee. Mind you, this book was self-published by a 9-year old whose therapist and adoptive parents were clearly heavily involved in the writing process. On the other hand, most books I've read about being an Asian immigrant, the Korean War, Japanese colonization, etc., were written by people who either directly experienced that situation (for example, Sook Nyul Choi's *Year of Impossible Goodbyes*) or is the child of someone who did (for example, Linda Sue Park's *When My Name Was Keoko*). So when we celebrate that there are many insider authors of Asian American children's literature (thanks to the CCBC for compiling those statistics), I just want to point out that there are sub-topics for which this is not true, and this has implications for the types of stories being told and circulated, and whose voices and perspectives are being left out.
You can read a bit more about my dissertation work (and other thoughts on Asian American children's literature) here: http://readingspark.wordpress.com/2009/04/08/dissertation-abstract/
Warmly, Sarah
Sarah Park, Ph.D. Assistant Professor of LIS St. Catherine University sparkLA79 at gmail.com http://sarahpark.com 310-922-5979
On Thu, Sep 3, 2009 at 11:25 AM, Megan Schliesman < schliesman at education.wisc.edu> wrote:
> Here's what we'll be talking about this month on CCBC-Net. We invite you
> to continue to share announcments for the next day or so.
>
> *First Half September: New Asian/Pacific and Asian/Pacific American
> Children?s and Young Adult Literature. *In the past few years there?s
> been a welcome increase in the number of books reflecting Asian/Pacific
> and Asian/Pacific American experiences published for children and teens.
> (You can see the CCBC?s annual statistics on this and other dimensions
> of multicultural publishing at
> http://www.education.wisc.edu/ccbc/books/pcstats.asp ). As with all
> multicultural publishing, the numbers are always relative?it?s still a
> shockingly small percentage of publishing overall-- but it?s exciting to
> see newer writers and artists for children and teens, such as Naomi
> Hirahara, Cynthia Kadohata, Suzy Lee, Moying Li, Kashmira Sheth, Gene
> Luen Yang, Paula Yoo, and others joining veterans such as Sheila
> Hamanaka, Yumi Heo, Mitali Perkins, Allen Say, Laurence Yep. . . (the
> list goes on), in creating books that speak to some of the many and
> varied dimensions of Asian/Pacific heritage in our nation and the world.
> During the first half of September on CCBC-Net, we?ll talk about
> Asian/Pacific literature for children and teens, from individual books,
> authors and artists to the importance of having an ever-growing body of
> engaging, culturally authentic books available for children and teens.
>
> *Second Half of September: Crossover Books, Part II. *We first visited
> the topic of crossover books?titles that are marketed to both children
> and adult audiences, in June 1999. That discussion was inspired in part
> by the ever-growing popularity of ?Harry Potter ,? which was already
> having noticeable crossover appeal. Today, it seems we think about
> crossover less in terms of marketing and more in terms of how the lines
> between children?s/young adult and adult literature are not always
> easily defined, at least when it comes to appeal. From ?The Book Thief?
> to ?American Born Chinese? to ?Twilight? and beyond, we?ll revisit the
> topic of ?crossover books? in light of the past ten years of publishing
> during the second half of September.
>
>
> Megan
>
>
> --
> Megan Schliesman, Librarian
> Cooperative Children's Book Center
> School of Education, University of Wisconsin-Madison
> 600 N. Park Street, Room 4290
> Madison, WI 53706
>
> 608/262-9503
> schliesman at education.wisc.edu
>
> www.education.wisc.edu/ccbc/
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> CCBC-Net mailing list
> CCBC-Net at lists.education.wisc.edu
> Visit this link to read archives or to unsubscribe...
> http://lists.education.wisc.edu/mailman/listinfo/ccbc-net
>
Received on Thu 03 Sep 2009 03:26:21 PM CDT
