Children's Literature Collections Research Articles

A critical review of the Indonesian translation of "Be a Coronavirus Fighter"

This paper aims to offer criticism on an Indonesian translation of Be a Coronavirus Fighter. The book is one of the children's literature collections that discusses how children should view the pandemic and protect themselves from the virus. The study employed a systematic evaluation based on Berman's methods by comparing the English and Indonesian text versions. The Indonesian translation was done by Emil Salim, a well-known figure in the translation industry. At a macro level, high adherence was found in text function consistencies, catering to educating young readers about the virus and its effects. At a micro level, however, some expressions were translated in adult-level and less-contemporary language. A conclusion can be drawn that it should use a more contemporary children's language level to represent the original text better. © 2021 Karadeniz Technical University. All rights reserved.

Children's Folklore in the Academic Library: Reorganization for Context and Collection Management

Traditional literature (including folk tales, fairy tales, and fables) is valued in academic children's literature collections for its value in both direct use (real or hypothetical) with children and the historical, cultural, and anthropological study of folklore. The “timeless” feel of these works, along with their distinctively liminal place between fiction and nonfiction, can lead them to be perceived as indefinitely useful, even beyond their unusually long standard retention period. Nevertheless, in a non-archival academic children’s literature collection, routine assessment of traditional literature is necessary and even valuable. This article situates traditional literature in the context of children’s literature and its academic study, then describes how the children’s folklore collection in one academic library was bifurcated to improve access, browsing ability, context, and use of shelf space. Considerations, including thoughts on developing assessment and weeding criteria, are spelled out for collections considering a similar undertaking.

Creating a Culture of Readers through Collection Development and Outreach

Children's literature collections in academic libraries present a unique opportunity for librarians to develop engaging outreach programs for students, faculty, and community members. The Curriculum Resource Center at Bowling Green State University's Wm. T. Jerome Library has developed several popular events that both promote the collection and the central mission of creating a culture of reading. In this case study, three of the most successful endeavors – Mock Caldecott, April Madness, and Sneak Peek - are highlighted to provide insight into how we integrate our carefully developed collection into programs that inspire excitement and build community around reading.

Children's Literature Collections: Approaches to Research. Eds Keith O'Sullivan and Pádraic Whyte

<i>Children's Literature Collections: Approaches to Research</i>. Eds Keith O'Sullivan and Pádraic Whyte

An Examination of the Tale The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse in the USM de Grummond Children's Literature Collection

The purpose of this study is to examine the different versions of the classic folk tale Town Mouse, Country Mouse contained within the USM de Grummond Chldren's Literature Collection, including scholarly analysis, authorship, and changes over time in the details of the story.

Keith O'Sullivan and Pádraic Whyte (editors), Children's Literature Collections: Approaches to Research

Keith O'Sullivan and Pádraic Whyte (editors), <i>Children's Literature Collections: Approaches to Research</i>

Children's Literature Collections: Approaches to Research ed. by Keith O'Sullivan and Pádraic Whyte

Reviewed by: Children's Literature Collections: Approaches to Research ed. by Keith O'Sullivan and Pádraic Whyte Minjie Chen (bio) Children's Literature Collections: Approaches to Research. Edited by Keith O'Sullivan and Pádraic Whyte. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017. Children's Literature Collections: Approaches to Research is a valuable addition to scholarship on the origin and development of Irish children's literature. The twelve essays in the volume grew out of the National Collection of Children's Books (NCCB) project, which culminated in an online union catalog and database of over 250,000 children's books from five libraries in Dublin, dating from the sixteenth century up to 2014. The book's title is suggestive of methodological contributions, but the real focus and strength of this essay collection is that it builds an understanding of the history of children's texts, reading, and education upon a rich heritage of primary materials held in Dublin. The disjuncture between the aspiration of the title words and the essence of the volume is betrayed by the latitude of "approach," used in the introduction section to variously refer to method (how) and foci of inquiry (what) of the studies. The collection engages with children's literature through the lenses of history, education, and literature. A major part of the book traces the origin and evolution of Irish children's literature, highlighting early texts, key publishers, and significant authors and works from the end of the seventeenth century through the twentieth. Máire Kennedy captures evidence of Irish children as readers and target consumers of instructional and educational books during the eighteenth century. She discusses children's exposure to hornbooks and chapbooks; notes the rise of illustrated books; demonstrates her skillful use of a variety of sources such as booksellers' advertisements, publishers' ledgers and subscription lists, guides and advice on reading, and adults' accounts of childhood reading; and helps us imagine young people's access to and interaction with books as child-oriented literature gradually increased. Anne Markey's study is bracketed by two dates: 1696, when the earliest Irish-published textbook specifically aimed at young readers was issued (as discovered by the NCCB bibliographical project), and 1810, the year before the foundation of the Kildare Place Society in Dublin. Kennedy's findings notwithstanding, Markey points out the paucity of children's books in early eighteenth-century Ireland. Using British children's literature as a benchmark, she describes the Irish children's book market as dominated by instructional texts as well as by imported, translated, and reprinted works from England and France. She identifies key publishers and pioneer writers whose works, though modest in quantity, marked the birth of indigenous Irish children's literature and made important contributions to the development of English children's literature. Aileen Douglas's analysis focuses on the works of Maria Edgeworth, the most influential Irish children's author to have emerged by the end of the eighteenth century. Douglas sheds light on the dual nature [End Page 496] of Edgeworth's didacticism and argues that her Early Lessons series presents an innovative literary representation of children's selfhood. In her role as novelist/educationalist, Edgeworth not only imparts factual information and moral teachings but also demonstrates how child protagonists are able to learn and to improve through the process of "gradual instruction," a manifestation of her educational principles. Susan M. Parkes picks up in 1811 where Markey leaves off; she devotes her essay to the significant role of the Kildare Place Society (KPS) in producing widely disseminated reading materials for Irish children and in promoting mass education. Parkes attributes the success of the Society, which admired the Quakers, to the neutrality of its publications in terms of Irish identity and religious persuasion. Several major authors and canonical works from the nineteenth century onward receive close reading, paratextual analysis, and sociopolitical critiques in this volume, yielding insightful (re)interpretations. Ciara Ní Bhroin studies Fairy Legends and Traditions of the South of Ireland, the first collection of oral tales to have been published in Britain or Ireland. She examines how the collection underwent drastic transformations against the backdrop of cultural and political shifts in Ireland, beginning as an...

Stories from Asia: The Asian Children's Literature Collection by National Library Board Singapore

Stories from Asia: The Asian Children's Literature Collection by National Library Board Singapore

Preservation Needs of Children's Literature in Academic Libraries

A preservation needs survey of children's literature collections at the University of Colorado at Boulder Libraries is analyzed. The genre, the subject of a growing body of scholarship, has enduring value and is collected in universities to support programs in literature, education, art, cultural history, and more. Even well known children's literature titles prior to the twentieth century are now scarce; preservation of modern titles is not an unreasonable precaution. In this survey, older titles housed in special collections had many problems as a result of their provenance. Too brittle to be rebound and too rare to be replaced, yet too expensive to conserve, these volumes were boxed and placed in the palliative environment of an off-site storage facility. Cataloged online for the first time in preparation for their transfer, they are being used more heavily; their condition is monitored each time they are recalled. Out of copyright and usually short texts, the brittle titles are good candidates for in-house digitization. The survey found that the new titles in circulation cannot be subjected to simple re-binding. Processed and handled with consideration for their structure, the modern children's titles in the academic library setting will survive so long that replacements, when they are eventually needed, are not likely to be available.

JOURNEY THROUGH A WRINKLE IN TIME AND EXPLORE THE WORLD OF ‘SACRED IDLENESS’

The de Grummond Children's Literature Collection at the University of Southern Mississippi holds valuable materials concerning Madeleine L'Engle, including her speech entitled ‘The Freedom of Service in the Life of the Writer’, personal letters sent from L'Engle to the University of Southern Mississippi, and the original, unpublished transcripts of A Wrinkle in Time. Within these transcripts is an alternate form of the ‘Aunt Beast’ chapter called the ‘Beautiful Beast’, important deleted passages concerning war and descriptions of ‘IT’, and a discarded chapter about a school planet that sheds light on L'Engle's intentions for A Wrinkle in Time. Because of these changes to the original transcript, reading the published version of A Wrinkle in Time causes one to not know for certain what L'Engle's overall objective is for the text. This paper presents an analysis of these new sources, and concludes that L'Engle's main theme for A Wrinkle in Time was to replace the mode of secure thought that contributes to the likes of totalitarianism, communism, and dictatorships with George MacDonald's concept of ‘Sacred Idleness’ and thinking with one's imaginative, subconscious mind.

Building a Collection of American Indian Children's Literature at the University of Washington Libraries

ABSTRACTThe American Indian Children's Literature Collection is a significant body of historical children's materials written by and about American Indians. This article describes the recent creation of this collection and covers issues pertaining to identification and maintenance, assessment, historical and literary context, collection development, access, subject cataloging, promotion and preservation.

Selecting Children's Literature for Academic Librarians

ABSTRACT Due to tracking into specific areas of librarianship, most recent graduates of library degree programs are unfamiliar with areas not their own. Academic librarians, for example, often do not take classes in children's literature. However, academic librarians supporting education programs are often called on to develop and manage children's literature collections. This article provides suggestions from an education librarian who had to learn about children's literature on the job.

Evaluating the Children's Literature Collection

This article reports on an evaluation study of the Children's Literature Collection conducted at Gustavus Adolphus College Library in 1992. Among the goals were to assess quality and extent of the collection and to find out why students were dissatisfied with the collection. The methodology included the inductive method of checking a collection against a major review instrument and annual lists of "best" titles, as well as a user survey in order to compare findings about quality and size of the collection with students' perception of the two measures. Surprisingly it was found that students major dissatisfaction stemmed not so much from lack of quality and quantity of the collection but rather from problems with access via the online catalog and shelf arrangement.

New to Children's Literature?

New to Children's Literature? Virginia L. Wolf (bio) Glenn Edward Sadler , ed. Teaching Children's Literature: Issues, Pedagogy, Resources. New York: MLA, 1992. Are you interested in graduate programs in children's literature? Teaching a course in children's literature for the first time? Or thinking about doing some research in the field? If so, Glenn Sadler's new book, another in MLA's Options for Teaching series, will provide assistance. Even veteran teachers of children's literature will find this little book useful and stimulating. Organizing his material into five parts—"Critical Issues and Approaches," "Course Descriptions," "Selected Advanced Programs," "Two Children's Literature Collections," and "Readings and Resources"—Sadler attempts "to present a comprehensive report on the present state of teaching children's literature in undergraduate and graduate institutions" (ix). The book is not comprehensive, but selective. The most obvious absences occur in the first part. Where are those critics interested in structuralism and deconstruction? Why are there so few feminist pieces and so few exploring reader response? Why is there so little about multiculturalism? Why is there such a heavy emphasis on fairy tales, fantasy, and romanticism and so little about realism? There is nothing about nonfiction and little about poetry and little about picture books. Turning to the course descriptions, I was intrigued, but again curious, about what is missing. Were I to wish to implement any of these course descriptions, I would first contact the author for additional details. Similarly, only four of the advanced programs in children's literature are described, although a booklet about graduate programs published by the Children's Literature Association includes many more than that. And there are only two of the nearly 50 notable children's literature collections described. The names and addresses of the other collections are provided in the last part of the book as are an excellent selected bibliography of [End Page 215] references works, textbooks, and criticism and a list of periodicals, annuals, and organizations. Even as I read this part, I missed a few of the books I looked for in the bibliography and noted that the address for the Children's Literature Association is incorrect. In my mind, these disappointments are not very serious. To begin with, at this point in time, I would not expect one little book to be comprehensive. The last 20-some years have been too rich and varied in their development for that to be possible. Only the claim, therefore, is disturbing. Similarly, given the need to be selective, I am not very surprised by what was included and excluded. Focusing on the relationship between adult literature and children's literature, U. C. Knoepflmacher's introduction is especially fine. In my mind, the best criticism never forgets this relationship and its rich implications for defining children's literature and its audiences. Knoepflmacher points out that these implications work both ways and also define adult literature and its audience. Even more importantly, he explores the political implications of our traditionally having valued adult literature over children's literature. The first section of part one surprises me. Issues of canon and canon formation seem to be old hat for those of us long in the field, yet this is the largest group of articles. To be sure, those new to the field may require this background. Then, too, these are interesting pieces that do not fall back simply on the assertion that aesthetic value defines a canonical work. History, culture, psychology, and political power are explored as sources of canonization. J. D. Stahl, in "Canon Formation: A Historical and Psychological Perspective," traces the concept of the child as it was created and evolved as fundamental to the creation of those children's books valued in any one period of history. In "On Teaching the Canon of Children's Literature," John Griffith and Charles Frey affirm the necessity of exposing the values of children's books as usually those of "well-to-do, well-educated whites, males, Christians, northern Europeans" (23). Bruce Ronda's "An American Canon of Children's Literature" emphasizes what he sees as the three central "cultural conversations carried on in the United States and evident in...

Dromkeen: Promoting Children's Literature as a Dynamic Art

Dromkeen:Promoting Children's Literature as a Dynamic Art Karen Patricia Smith (bio) Prentice, Jeffrey and Bettina Bird . Dromkeen: A Journey into Children's Literature. New York: Henry Holt, 1987. Accounts of the origins of children's literature collections are few and far between and works discussing the development of Australian children's literature collections are rarer still. Juliana Bayfield's recent article in Phaedrus: An International Annual of Children's Literature Research entitled "The Children's Literature Research Collection of the State Library of South Australia," mentions several collections, but not all of the collections—even in libraries—have, as of yet, been fully identified (56). Given this state of affairs, it is most helpful to have Dromkeen: A Journey Into Children's Literature, a work by Jeffrey Prentice and Bettina Bird, which offers a general history and overview of an important collection. The primary purpose of Prentice and Bird's book is well stated in their Preface: When writing this book we had several purposes in mind: to put forward the philosophy underlying the concept of the Dromkeen Collection of children's literature, originated and put into practice by its founders, Joyce and Court Oldmeadow, to present an overview of the Collection and its associated activities; and to provide some insight into the development of Australian children's literature from colonial times to the present day . . . We have not attempted a critical work, rather we have endeavoured to present an appreciation of the creative works of the many authors and illustrators of children's books who are represented by material in the Collection. (7) What emerges is a fascinating picture of the origins of a collection and some tantalizing insights into the nature of its holdings. Dromkeen traces the conception of the idea for the collection, describes the physical layout of the premises, offers a brief overview of Australian children's literature and an account of the activities taking place at the homestead where the collection is housed. Additionally, the authors discuss the recognition awarded to the founders of the collection for their pioneering work as well as that accorded by the founders to others for excellence in the field of children's literature. Finally, the authors speculate on the future of Dromkeen as a developing project. The first chapter, "Dromkeen—The Realization of a Dream" traces the efforts of Joyce and Court Oldfellow, booksellers, to establish a place where art work could be placed on display for the benefit of children, thus enabling young people to develop a true understanding of the creative process. The steps taken by the couple to realize this dream are outlined, beginning with their business in East Ivanhoe in Melbourne in 1958, through several moves as their business and collections rapidly outgrew available space and culminating in the purchase of Dromkeen Homestead in 1973. This relatively brief chapter is just long enough to give the reader an understanding of the motivations of the founders, the initial difficulties of such a project, and the dedication with which the owners relentlessly pursued their dream. Chapter Two, "The Fascination of Dromkeen—A Home for Children's Literature," discusses the major rooms in which the collection is housed and some of the high points of the collection. It is here that the reader begins to realize that the illustrations are among the book's strong points. Prentice and Bird have endeavored to present clear and often entrancing examples of the current holdings (as of January 1, 1985) of the collection in black and white as well as in color. A wonderful painting by Outhwaite, one of Australia's most well known illustrators, hangs in the Red Room. It shows a delicate fairy in the Victorian style, riding on the back of a bat. (The drawing was also featured in a poster sold in conjunction with the collection's traveling exhibit in Australia during summer 1988). This is a previously unpublished painting which amply illustrates one of the great values of the collection, that is, that it provides unpublished and/or pre-publication materials not available in other places, for viewing by the public. Another illustration also in the Red Room shows a marvelously delicate design done...