도시 배경의 아동문학에 관한 연구

Abstract

This article examines children’s life in the city in Ruth Sawyer’s Roller Skates in light of New Historicism. It understands the literature on the connection between texts and their historical contexts. Its critics are interested in power, gender, race and socially marginalized people in texts. Focusing on interpreting the social, cultural and political factors in the text through the lens of New Criticism helps readers understand better the author’s intention. Traditionally, children’s literature has not paid attention to urban as the setting for child characters’ play and activities with hygiene problems and air pollution. Roller Skates, set in New York in the late 19th century, describes Lucinda Wyman’s city adventure on roller skates. The city already became a multicultural society with the increasing immigrants. Lucinda befriends with her neighbours and her empathy eventually enhances multicultural competence. The novel implies that a child-friendly city can be a good city for the citizen. This study suggests that using the environment is more important than the simple division between rural and urban.