Children’s Literature and Comics/Graphic Novels at MLA 2019

Going to the MLA Convention in Chicago? Here are all the sessions on children and YA literature, and on comics.  Or, at least, this is what I could find.  If I’ve missed anything, please let me know.  Thanks! 012: Comics Fandom in Transition  12:00 PM—1:15 PM Thursday, Jan 3, 2019  Hyatt Regency – Roosevelt 3

Children's Literature Association Quarterly 43.4 (Winter 2018): cover

Migration, Refugees, and Diaspora in Children’s Literature (ChLAQ)

Separating children from their parents is a violation of basic human rights and does not deter asylum-seekers. Hostile to facts and compassionate only towards himself, Mr. Trump has pursued this policy with reckless indifference to its consequences. As of the end of last month (over four months after the court-imposed deadline to reunite these families),

Fight Stupidity; Keep Reading: A Dispatch from the Internationale Jugendbibliothek (on KSU English blog)

Over at Kansas State University’s English Department blog, I have a post on my three months at the Internationale Jugendbibliothek in Munich.  I’ll excerpt a little bit here (the first paragraph, and the conclusion) but go over there to read the whole thing (and to see more photos). Since the first of September I have

Julius Lester on Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn

Context, Privilege, and Pain

Last month, there was some on-line discussion about this quote (from me) in a CNN.com article: But Nel argues that the answer isn’t simply removing “problematic” children’s classics like Mark Twain’s “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” which uses the N-word 219 times, from school reading lists. Such stories, “if used carefully, appropriately and in context can

P. Shauers, Donald and the Golden Crayon

Donald and the Golden Crayon

Today (20 Oct. 2018) would be Crockett Johnson’s 112th birthday.  In commemoration of that event, I have two – yes, two – posts for you!  The first is an interview with the author and the publisher of the new satirical book Donald and the Golden Crayon.  Enjoy! “In the middle of the night, Donald woke

The author, Teddy, and Panda, c. 1972

The Archive of Childhood, Part 3: Earliest Memories

The third in my occasional “Archives of Childhood” series. The Archive of Childhood, Part 1: Crayons (27 Dec. 2014) The Archive of Childhood, Part 2: The Golliwog (13 Jan. 2015) What are your earliest memories? Recent conversations with family and friends have challenged my assumption that most people remember early childhood. I now wonder if it is

Ruth Krauss: photo from 1951 Herald Tribune Book News

Ruth Krauss in 1951

In honor of Ruth Krauss’s 117th birthday (today, which she would have celebrated as her 107th birthday), here’s a photo you likely have not seen before.  It appeared in the May 12, 1951 issue of the Herald Tribune Book News, which described Krauss’s latest book (I Can Fly, illustrated by Mary Blair) as follows: “Very small girl

proposed Trump logo, satirically created by Sam Kuo

Why Trump Jails Crying Children. How We Resist. (A Twitter Essay)

1. The Trump regime feels threatened by crying children because they – and all refugees – refute the Trumpist/fascist lie that humanity depends upon citizenship. – Philip Nel (@philnel) June 21, 2018 2. As Hannah Arendt wrote of refugees, they “have lost all distinctive political qualities,” “lost all other qualities and relationships–except that they [are]