Reading Race: Aboriginality in Australian Children's Literature
By (Author) Clare Bradford
Melbourne University Press
Melbourne University Press
8th July 1997
Australia
Tertiary Education
Non Fiction
Literary studies: general
Social and cultural history
820.9352039915
Paperback
292
Width 141mm, Height 214mm, Spine 19mm
384g
In Reading Race Clare Bradford looks at the ways in which Australia's indigenous peoples have been - and continue to be - represented in books for children. These varying representations have helped to colour the attitudes, beliefs and assumptions of different generations of Australians. She draws on examples from popular and literary children's books of all genres - fiction, non-fiction, picture books and school texts - to uncover the different ideologies of race that have informed Australian children's texts from the nineteenth century to the present. In doing so, she demonstrates striking cultural shifts in the representation of Aboriginality over time. Reading Race offers a ground-breaking and intelligent picture of how Australian children's books, by both white and Aboriginal writers, have negotiated the matter of race.
Clare Bradford is an Associate Professor in the School of Literary and Communication Studies at Deakin University. She has published four books, and her many journal articles and book chapters on aspects of children's literature have appeared in Australian and international publications.