Tag Archives: children

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Inanimate Objects and their Significant Role in Our Imagination’s

We talked a bit last week about how Little Black Sambo seemed to have this “familiarity” to it and I feel the same can be said for The Pasteboard Bandit. As I was reading I found myself remembering the book (but honestly, mostly its movie adaptation) The Indian in the Cupboard, and how its central fantastical theme was this idea of bringing inanimate objects to life. In psychology there’s this term known as “animalistic thinking”, which denotes that children within a certain age frame believe that inanimate objects are real. This theme is rampant when it comes to children’s entertainment, especially when we consider television and movies (Barney, Toy Story). We can reach a little further with this idea when it comes to myths and legends. When we are told as children that Santa Claus exists and that the Boogieman lives under our bed, we, as children, are quick to believe it, even with no proof. This resonated with me as I read “The Land Behind The Sun” within The Brownies Book, and remembering my irrational fear of something living in my closet just because my older cousin told me it did.

Obviously, as we get older we realize the folly of our thought processes as children, but we never forget what it was like to believe outlandish and fantastical ideas. I honestly believe that if this was not the case, that literature and entertainment of the more ‘imaginative” sort would not be possible. Having moments in life in which you believe the impossible is possible, whether it’s believing that the tooth fairy exists or that your dolls or figures are real, is a requirement to having, let alone developing, an imagination.

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Time Going By

In Hughes’ poems, I think he has a strong connection with time. He talks about winter in one poem and them Spring in another, and then Autumn in another. Also, in his poems “Winter Moon”, he talks about how “sharp” the moon is and I found that kind of interesting. How can a moon be sharp? It’s round in shape to the naked eye and doesn’t look to have any edges. As far as children goes, they probably will only link the moon with “round” rather than “sharp.” Hughes also says that we need to hold onto our dreams in his “Dreams” poem because once they are gone, are life will seem as if its missing something. In a way I think he is trying to tell children to cherish what they have now and to indulge in their imaginations because once they grow older as time passes by, shown by the seasons changing, they will no longer have the luxury of indulging in their imaginations and will be forced to face reality and lose their dreams. The idea of children growing older and having to face reality rather than indulge in their dreams is further supported in his “After Many Springs” poem. In this poem, he says that he cannot find the fairies anymore and wonders if he is “too old to see the fairies dance.” So that is to say, if children cannot cherish their dreams now and let loose their imaginations, as time goes by, and they lose their luxury to these dreams and fantasies, they will feel as if a part of them is missing and their life wouldn’t feel complete so it’s better for them to cherish all of that when they can.

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The Anti-Slavery Alphabet

The Anti-Slavery Alphabet was very interesting to me. The fact that such a political piece was directed at children and attempting to catch their attention is interesting. The author seems to want to influence the younger generation, which is something many do now. By using language the author attempts to both entice the child reader as well as make sure they understand the basic principles of what an abolitionist is standing up for. The rhyming of the poem also makes the grim topic somewhat enjoyable for the child reader, which is important.

 

” ‘E’ is the eagle, soaring high; An emblem of the free; But while we chain our brother man; Our type he cannot be.”

” ‘I’ is the Infant, from the arms of its fond mother torn, And, at a public auction, sold with horses, cows and corn.”

” ‘L’ is the Lash, that brutally he swung around its head, threatening that “if it cried again, he’d whip it till ’twas dead.”

 

These quotes all stood out to me. The first seems to be calling upon the child’s sense of humanity. The fact that the symbol of the country is the symbol of hope and freedom, however there are people who are no different then themselves who are not able to enjoy this freedom. The next two were some that I found to be a very harsh reality to be in a children’s “alphabet” book, however it was probably quite effective. To bring up the selling of children from their families, mothers in particular, this puts the children reading this in the shoes of those who is living this. The power in these last two quotes makes it apparent how important and urgent the author felt this issue to be.

I would really love to learn more about this book, I never knew about it before this and would love to get more of a background on it.

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Peter Pan : An Adult’s Fantasy

The first thing that struck me while reading Jacqueline Rose’s, The Case of Peter Pan, was the fact that it was about Peter Pan. The story of the boy who never wants to become an adult. He wants to stay a little boy forever. He NEVER wants to grow up. I felt this was the perfect entrance piece of writing to read for this course because it gave a good insight to some of the history of Peter Pan but it also challenged ideas and raised questions that probably wouldn’t have come up otherwise. But what I really wanted to focus on is what really stood out to me. I was thinking about it through the entire text was when Rose said,

“Peter Pan offers us the child — forever.”

While reading this, I went back to Beverly Clark’s, “Kiddie Lit” where she mentions that there is some part in us that “values childhood. But we also dismiss it.” People love taking trips down memory lane to the times before responsibility and work and paying bills. I know I do. So there is a little Peter Pan in all of us I guess. Some part of us that wants to stay young. However this is not acceptable “adult behavior”. Eventually we all “grow up” and become a rational, responsible adult. Peter Pan never does. He is an adult’s fantasy.

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Response to Kiddie Lit

In Beverly Lyon Clark’s book, Kiddie Lit, she mentions on page 5 that women “grind children under [their] heels. She also quotes Margaret Fuller who said, “Now there is no woman, only an overgrown child.” With this quote, it explains why women “grind children under [their] heels”. This is because women can’t be acknowledged as an adult until they have not only grown up, but has lost any part of them that would make them seem immature, lacking confidence, irresponsible, and so on. However, if that is the case, then those are the attributes in which we apply to children. Women try so hard not to be associated with children, but in reality, it’s just those attributes in which women do not want to be associated with. However, I believe that it’s not just women who are viewed as a child if they so much as act a little immature and play jokes. I feel that men who are always joking around or saying unintelligent things can also be viewed as a child by other men who have gained respect and by other women who feel that they are mature or have also gained respect. This is seen by interactions around us everyday. With my friends, because I like to play around and joke with them, I am viewed as a child who is immature. But I also view them as childish too because they play around with me as well even though they are older than me. I also feel that though we may play around, when it is time to be serious about things, we can be and we can respect each other as we should.

Thus, I do not believe that just because someone likes to play around or likes to talk in slang or act like children sometimes, that they cannot be overall, mature or respectable.  It isn’t simply that not being a child makes you an adult. There is more to that and I feel that if we stop associating terms like “child” or “childish” with things like irresponsibility, naivety, or stupidity, then being called a child wouldn’t be such a bad thing. In fact, that isn’t even what really makes a child if you simply think better of them. Therefore, if we begin to think better of children, give them some respect, acknowledge their opinions and don’t laugh off their questions as they are trying to learn, then women and men wouldn’t need to set aside their playfulness and wouldn’t be afraid to act more like a person with a bright personality, than just as a model figure in society in order to gain a title of respect that they shouldn’t even need to earn.

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The Pleasures of Children’s Literature

The excerpt from Perry Nodelman and Mevis Reimer’s text focuses on the relationship children actually have with children’s literature. In addition, it also explores how adults interaction with children’s literature differs from that of children and what causes these differences. One of the main differences comes from the literary “repertoire” that adults have versus the one children have. Adults tend to have a greater understanding of both language and its use.Furthermore adults can apply their past knowledge and experience towards the literature. This causes adults to have a different understanding and view of the literature. Adults would would be able to draw more from a children’s text because they have the capacity to. Children do not or rather cannot see more in a children’s text because their literary “repertoire” is limited. In this sense, Nodelman and Reimer point out that it is actually to difficult to decide what kind of children’s literature should and should not be read to/by children. In addition adults are the ones who inevitably decide what is considered “appropriate” literature for children. They do so based on their own hypothetical guess’s of what children would like in literature. Nodelman and Reimer  state this is not effective since the adults are making guess’s and cannot really know what the child might like in literature without actually being exposed to it. A child’s lack of knowledge allows him/her read any children’s literature and end up enjoying it. I think Nodelman and Reimer make an excellent point: adults should not decide what is considered “good” children’s literature for children. They themselves are no longer children and cannot interpret  it the same way a child does. What adults may consider  inappropriate is therefore irrelevant since a child may not even know that what they are reading can be viewed in that context.

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Little People: Thoughts

The article offers a somewhat informal timeline of the notion of “childhood”, which will help our class to better understand the modern definition of childhood and what children’s literature is truly about. Childhood did not always hold the same meaning as we know it today, there was a time where childhood was virtually nonexistent. The author reviews pieces of literature called the Yale series, which is a compilation of research and essays written by social scientist to examine how to notion of “childhood” came to be and its evolution through the years.

The first glimpse we get into the past is the Middle ages to the sixteenth century. This was a time where the average age to be married was quite young (preteens), and little to no consent was needed by parents for their children to be married; unless you were a daughter of nobel  blood. It is logical to assume that when these “children” were wed, they would be off to start their own household. However, depending on what part of Europe you were from and your or your family’s profession, it was forbidden for households to be split up. Even before marriage, boys and girls were sent away for an average of five years to learn trades or mannerisms from higher classes. Children were basically seen and treated like adults.

In the eighteenth century, there was a boom in  bastard children who were either murdered, abandoned, or left in special hospitals. Most of the children left in these special hospitals died for various reasons including poor sanitary practices, neglect, and even experimentation as we discussed in class. Later on in the nineteenth century in France, it was possible for a bastard child to seek child support from their fathers, so long as he was not married. This was the start of the realization that children ought to be cared for.

Relating this to the early twentieth century, many children worked in factories and sweat shops to help support their families, some were even as  young as seven! according to the Yale series, children felt a sense of pride and independence in the work that they did. after child labor laws were set into practice, it was an extreme polar change for children. Whereas once they were able to support themselves and their families, they were now required to go to school, which did not really give them much freedom to experience “childhood” and play anyway. From then on innocence was instilled on children and the idea of “appropriateness” was brought into play.