"Diversity is not praiseworthy: it is reality."
-Malinda Lo
“By affirming their vision of the world, well-written, authentic multiethnic children’s literature can provide healing from the damages of living in a racist society.” (Barker, 2010)
Barker, J. (2010). Racial identification and audience in Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry and The Watsons Go to Birmingham--1963. Children’s Literature in Education, 41, 118-145.
“...When we fight for diverse books we're really just fighting for a more honest literature. Books that tell the truth. Because when we say, "We Need Diverse Books' we're really saying "We Need Books That Don't Lie To Us About Who We Are Or Whether We Exist.”
-Daniel José Older
“If you want to make a human being into a monster, deny them, at the cultural level, any reflection of themselves.”
-Junot Díaz
“Books are sometimes windows, offering views of worlds that may be real or imagined, familiar or strange. These windows are also sliding glass doors, and readers have only to walk through in imagination to become part of whatever world has been created or recreated by the author. When lighting conditions are just right, however, a window can also be a mirror. Literature transforms human experience and reflects it back to us, and in that reflection we can see our own lives and experiences as part of the larger human experience. Reading, then, becomes a means of self-affirmation, and readers often seek their mirrors in books.”
-Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop
-Malinda Lo
“By affirming their vision of the world, well-written, authentic multiethnic children’s literature can provide healing from the damages of living in a racist society.” (Barker, 2010)
Barker, J. (2010). Racial identification and audience in Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry and The Watsons Go to Birmingham--1963. Children’s Literature in Education, 41, 118-145.
“...When we fight for diverse books we're really just fighting for a more honest literature. Books that tell the truth. Because when we say, "We Need Diverse Books' we're really saying "We Need Books That Don't Lie To Us About Who We Are Or Whether We Exist.”
-Daniel José Older
“If you want to make a human being into a monster, deny them, at the cultural level, any reflection of themselves.”
-Junot Díaz
“Books are sometimes windows, offering views of worlds that may be real or imagined, familiar or strange. These windows are also sliding glass doors, and readers have only to walk through in imagination to become part of whatever world has been created or recreated by the author. When lighting conditions are just right, however, a window can also be a mirror. Literature transforms human experience and reflects it back to us, and in that reflection we can see our own lives and experiences as part of the larger human experience. Reading, then, becomes a means of self-affirmation, and readers often seek their mirrors in books.”
-Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop