乐播传媒

As a 乐播传媒 student, Brenna Callahan 鈥�15 helped run a literacy program at Montello School, a Lewiston elementary school about a mile from campus. That work often involved reading to the pupils.

One day Callahan read the picture book Nabeel鈥檚 New Pants: An Eid Tale to a Muslim child.

It was the first time that he had seen a book about that Islamic holiday, says Callahan. 鈥淗e saw himself in that book in a way he hadn鈥檛 before. And that was powerful.鈥�

There is considerable power in children鈥檚 books. It鈥檚 a formative power, especially in the case of picture books for younger children, with their rapidly developing intellects and personalities.

So what鈥檚 the formative impact on children of color when most picture books 鈥� as many as 90 percent 鈥� are all about white people? And if you want to lay hands on one of the relatively few books that feature diverse characters, what happens when the local library catalog can鈥檛 help you find them? And what if that library doesn鈥檛 even know which races or cultures are represented in its children鈥檚 book collection?

Krista Aronson, associate professor of psychology at 乐播传媒, has devoted considerable time and thought to such questions. And she has an answer.

As part of a team including Callahan, 乐播传媒 humanities librarian Christina Bell, and noted children鈥檚 author-illustrator Anne Sibley O鈥橞rien, Aronson has a three-fold set of resources that bring new accessibility to the world of diverse children鈥檚 books:

• First, there鈥檚 the Picture Book Collection, a comprehensive physical collection of some 2,000 diverse books. Housed at 乐播传媒鈥� George and Helen Ladd Library, the collection is nationally unique in that the books are available for anyone to sign out.
• Second is the itself, a public database that went live this week. Designed to mirror the ever-growing Picture Book Collection, the DBF makes 鈥� for the first time 鈥� diverse picture books findable by both the human characteristics and, importantly, narrative messages that recur in them.
• Third is an analytical method, based on the Diverse BookFinder resources, that will enable librarians and other book curators to understand how diversity is represented in their own picture book collections.

The Diverse BookFinder project, which recently received a grant of $250,000 from聽the federal Institute of Museum and Library Services, is a 鈥減otential game-changer鈥� for parents, librarians, and teachers 鈥� anyone seeking diverse children鈥檚 books, says Cheryl Klein, a member of the 乐播传媒 project鈥檚 advisory board and the editorial director for Lee and Low Books, which specializes in multicultural children’s titles.

Book learning

Aronson, who is biracial, studies how people, particularly the young, come to understand social constructs like race, and how such understanding affects interactions and psychological well-being.

Her dissertation at the University of Michigan focused on identity development among African American teenagers and the role that parents play in the socialization process. The size of the black community in Ann Arbor ensured she鈥檇 have a substantial pool of research subjects.

But when Aronson joined the 乐播传媒 faculty, in 2003, that meant a move to the nation鈥檚 whitest state and therefore different directions for her research. The inspiration for one new direction came from one of her daughters, Sophia, and Sophia鈥檚 relationships with white and Somali children at school.

When Sophia was about 6, 鈥渟he was bringing home difficult questions around the topics of race and immigration that she was being asked by her friends,鈥� says Aronson, 鈥渨hich gave me insight into some of the issues they were grappling with.鈥�

Aronson discovered psychological research in England exploring how picture books affect children鈥檚 attitudes towards refugee children. Experiments had shown that when children take in stories about different groups of children getting along well, they in turn tend to get along better with peers who are different from them.

Collaborating with Rupert Brown, a prominent social psychologist who studies prejudice and stereotyping, Aronson sought to follow up on and localize that prior research by studying children鈥檚 responses to books portraying interactions between white and Somali children in Lewiston.

But no such children鈥檚 books existed. So one of Aronson鈥檚 thesis students, Elizabeth Ellman 鈥�10, created stories under the guidance of two Mainers known for making diverse children鈥檚 books, writer Margy Burns Knight and illustrator-writer Anne Sibley O鈥橞rien. O鈥橞rien illustrated the stories for the research.

“These books mattered. They could actually shift children鈥檚 perceptions.”

Conducted in winter 2010 with support from the college鈥檚 Harward Center, Aronson鈥檚 experiment confirmed that so-called cross-group picture books can indeed promote better relationships among diverse kids. 鈥淚t was a wonderful learning experience for me and my students, and the community,鈥� Aronson says. She and O鈥橞rien went on to give a series of public workshops on the study.

Raised in South Korea by white American medical missionaries, and deeply impressed by her experiences there, O鈥橞rien has made it her mission to use children鈥檚 literature, as she says, to 鈥渆xplore and celebrate human difference.鈥� She has illustrated 32 children鈥檚 books and written 14 of those books, including I鈥檓 New Here, a picture book about immigrant children that was a Kirkus Reviews Best Book of 2015.

鈥淭he work with Krista was like, 鈥楨ureka!鈥欌�� O鈥橞rien says, because it provided 鈥渄ata that proved what I was betting on: that these books mattered that much, and that they could actually shift children鈥檚 perceptions.鈥�

That early work, Aronson says, 鈥済ot me thinking about picture books more broadly. I wanted to see what we could do with the books that are out there.鈥� And, she wondered, 鈥淲hat is out there?鈥�

鈥淎nd that鈥檚 how Annie and I started collecting the picture books.鈥�

First up: the Picture Book Collection

For both Ladd Library and the team that created the library鈥檚 Picture Book Collection, 鈥渋t was an early decision that we needed to make this usable for as many people as possible,鈥� says the library鈥檚 Christina Bell.

From Aronson鈥檚 perspective, as a researcher seeking to translate her work for the public, 鈥渋t鈥檚 important that these books don鈥檛 just sit in my lab and get utilized when I teach, or pulled off the shelf to analyze and then shoved back on there. I want my work to have meaning beyond, perhaps, the scholarly or the academic.鈥�

The fact that the books of the Picture Book Collection circulate makes the collection nationally unique. Collections of diverse children鈥檚 books are not unheard of, but access to them is restricted. Books in the 乐播传媒 collection, on the other hand, may be checked out in person by anyone with a 乐播传媒 ID or Ladd courtesy card, or remotely via interlibrary loan.

If access to the collection is straightforward, building the collection was anything but. 鈥淲hen we started this project I had no idea that it was going to be so difficult,鈥� Aronson says.

The paucity of books depicting people of color is 鈥渁 crisis for all of our children.”

For one thing, diverse picture books continue to constitute a small fraction of all children鈥檚 titles. Ten to 14 percent of picture books that are published annually feature people of color, 鈥渁nd that number has not budged since the late 1960s,鈥� Aronson says.

Yet, even as the proportion of diverse children鈥檚 books hasn鈥檛 budged, the proportion of diverse children has blossomed in the U.S., as O鈥橞rien points out. The paucity of books depicting people of color, she says, is 鈥渁 crisis for all of our children, because it鈥檚 not healthy or useful for white children to only see reflections of themselves,鈥� or for children of color not to see themselves in books.

鈥淚t doesn鈥檛 help build relationships, and it doesn鈥檛 help them function in the world that they鈥檙e entering.鈥�

The 乐播传媒 team’s book search led them to 111 publisher websites plus online resources including the website; online lists of titles, including ; the database of Baker and Taylor, an important book distributor; and a list provided by the Cooperative Children鈥檚 Book Center, the site of a major diverse book collection at the University of Wisconsin鈥揗adison.

The search is a dynamic, grassroots process. 鈥淚 learn of new publishers all the time,鈥� Aronson says, 鈥渁nd people bring titles to me,鈥� including a parent whose daughter had worked on thesis with Aronson, and who, at Commencement, recommended a book that she proceeded to add.

Next: the Diverse BookFinder

The 乐播传媒 team is taking its quest for picture book accessibility to a new plane with Because, after all, how valuable is a book that you can鈥檛 find?

If you go to your local library looking for multicultural picture books, it鈥檚 possible that the catalog won鈥檛 recognize the search terms that make most sense to you. Say you鈥檙e looking for The Sandwich Swap, a book about two best friends, one white and one Arab American, who have a falling-out over their lunches (peanut butter and jelly vs. hummus).

You might use a search term like 鈥淎rab American鈥� to find it. And you would come up blank. In the catalogs of the Library of Congress and WorldCat, the word 鈥淎rab鈥� does not appear in entries for The Sandwich Swap (whose author, by the way, is the queen of Jordan), although the book鈥檚 various subject headings do include 鈥渇ood habits.鈥�

Traditional library cataloging doesn鈥檛 tend to indicate the race or ethnicity of the people in a book, Bell explains. 鈥淚t will document in a line or so, very generally, what鈥檚 happening in the story, but there鈥檚 no indication of who is represented in the book.鈥�

Even publishers themselves don鈥檛 necessarily make findable their own books featuring people of color. 鈥淚t seems as though some, when they enter books, just don鈥檛 want to use any race, cultural, or ethnic labels,鈥� Aronson says.

As they amassed the collection, Aronson, O鈥橞rien, and Callahan identified and refined nine recurring categories that the DBF associates with diverse books.

The nine categories reflect various narrative messages that a given book is designed to convey. For example, 鈥淐ross Group鈥� books like Anna McQuinn鈥檚 My Friend Jamal portray interactions of characters across racial or cultural difference, while 鈥淎ny Child鈥� books tell stories about characters of color where race, culture, or ethnicity are incidental to the plot.

+How the Diverse BookFinder makes book messages searchable

The team, supported during this phase of the project by library cataloging consultant Deborah Tomaras, also created other code sets that indicate where stories take place and what racial or cultural groups the characters represent. The racial-variables coding is unique to the DBF, and Brenna Callahan herself coded the collection’s first 600 books and then wrote about that work for her senior thesis, with Aronson as her adviser.

Deployed in tandem with existing finding aids, the DBF promises to 鈥渞eally help people just cut through to what they鈥檙e after 鈥� which is the Holy Grail of publishing,鈥� says Klein of Lee and Low Books.

Alongside the Picture Book Collection and the Diverse BookFinder, the third piece of the project has been piloted and will be developed as funding becomes available: an online tool that can analyze a given collection of books for representational balance.

The same coding that helps individual users find a book or two via the DBF also allows wholesale analysis of a particular collection or grouping of books 鈥� in a library, say, or in a publisher鈥檚 new releases for a given year 鈥� to reveal what messages the collection is sending and how it might be improved.

鈥淥ne library that we did this with,鈥� Aronson says, 鈥渓earned that 2.4 percent of their books featured human characters of color, and that 65 percent of this small proportion were African American characters鈥� 鈥� though 19 percent of the population served by the library was Asian.

The messages within

On most Sundays, Aronson and her team members meet for tea and snacks, vetting new titles for the collection and plotting out objectives for the near- and longer terms.

Specifically, they鈥檙e pondering how or whether to represent book quality in the search language (鈥淚 can鈥檛 tell you that every book we have is of high quality,鈥� says a diplomatic Aronson) and, perhaps more important, how to broaden their system鈥檚 definition of diversity.

In some ways, 鈥渢his is one of the biggest public humanities projects 乐播传媒 has ever taken on.鈥�

鈥淚t made the most sense to start with racial and ethnic diversity because that鈥檚 where the idea was grounded originally,鈥� Aronson explains, referring to her cross-group research. But now, with a robust methodology in place, they can think about bringing in other dimensions of diversity.

鈥淲e鈥檝e talked about gender diversity, sexuality, orientation,鈥� says Bell. 鈥淲e鈥檝e talked about socioeconomic diversity, and immigration and refugees.鈥�

In fact, the Diverse BookFinder is as impressive for its potential as for what it has already made possible. 鈥淭his is not made for an internal audience, and this is not made wholly and completely for scholarship,鈥� Bell says. It鈥檚 about 鈥渕aking important work usable, accessible, findable for everybody.鈥�

In some ways, she adds, 鈥渢his is one of the biggest public humanities projects 乐播传媒 has ever taken on.鈥�

Aronson, who worked with students during Short Term 2017 to design a course using the Picture Book Collection as the basis for examining issues around children鈥檚 literature, says that she has 鈥渃ome to see picture books as socio-historical artifacts, as well as artistic artifacts. They capture our current thinking, I think, and ideas that we want to express to our children.

鈥淢essage matters,鈥� she adds. 鈥淚t鈥檚 not just numbers to me. It鈥檚 content, it鈥檚 message and representation.鈥�

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Supporters for the Diverse BookFinder include the federal Institute of Museum and Library Services and, at 乐播传媒, the Harward Center for Community Partnerships, the Faculty Development Fund, and Information and Library Services.