Do You See Your Family?: An Examination of Racially Mixed Characters & Families in Children’s Picture Books Available in School Media Centers
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
2002
37 pages
Susan S. Lovett
A Master’s paper submitted to the faculty of the School of Information and Library Science of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Library Science.
This study describes a survey of public elementary schools in Wake County, North Carolina determining what picture books that include mixed-race characters or mixed-race families are available and which are most commonly collected in public school media centers. Fifty-two of the seventy-nine elementary school media centers in the Wake County Public School System responded. Thirty-four titles that included a mixed-race character or a mixed-race family, where the family was not multiracial due to adoption, are identified. Nine titles prove to be highly collected, eleven titles are somewhat collected, and fourteen titles are rarely collected. Half of the highly collected titles are award winners, whereas the mid and rarely collected category books have not won any awards. The parental racial combinations vary, but the prevalent pairing is African American/Caucasian. Titles appear to be collected more because they are award-winning than because they represent a non-Caucasian population. The majority of elementary school media specialists have never been asked to find materials that include mixed-race characters or families. Overall, few of these books exist, and fewer still are collected in school media centers.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
- Table of Tables
- Introduction
- Literature Review
- Research Questions
- Methodology
- Locating Mixed Race Materials
- Instrument
- Procedure
- Findings & Discussion
- Conclusions
- Future Research
- References
- Appendices
- Appendix A – School Media Collection Survey Instrument
- Appendix B – Survey Data Arranged by Quantity Owned
- Appendix C – Annotated Picture Books
TABLE OF TABLES
- Table 1 – Identified Picture Books with Racially Mixed Characters or Families
- Table 2 – Highly Collected Titles
- Table 3 – Mid Collected Titles
- Table 4 – Rarely Collected Titles
- Table 5 – Total Racially Mixed Picture Book Collection per Media Center
- Table 6 – Titles Suggested by Surveyed Media Specialists
- Table 7 – Racial Pairings per Title
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