Virtual Event: A Conversation on Race & Identity in Children’s Books
Shifting the Narrative: A Conversation on Race & Identity in Children’s Books
October 28, 2021 • 3:00 p.m. Pacific • Free to the public
Livestreamed at: https://bit.ly/ShiftingNarrativePanel
University of Oregon’s Special Collections & University Archives, in partnership with Eugene Public Library, will present a virtual panel discussion which will address complex issues of race and identity in children’s literature—specifically, how race and identity have been represented in children’s books in the past, how and why authors, scholars, and illustrators are working to change that in the present, and panelists’ hopes for the future of children’s literature. This event is cosponsored by the OHC’s Endowment for Public Outreach in the Arts, Sciences and Humanities and the National Historical Publications & Records Commission.
Organizer Danielle Mericle, SCUA’s Curator of Visual Resources, says “I am really pleased to facilitate this conversation with contemporary children’s literature authors and scholars about the significance of race and identity in the genre. These creators and critics are leading forces in moving young adult and children’s literature into anti-racism and reframing our understandings of racism in children’s literature history.”
Panel participants include moderator Elizabeth Wheeler, University of Oregon Associate Professor of English; Kimberly Johnson, University of Oregon Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education and author of juvenile literature; Debbie Reese (Nambé Pueblo), founder, American Indians in Children’s Literature; and Chenoa (Lummi and S’Klallam) and Keith (Lummi) Egawa, authors and illustrators of children’s literature.
For more information contact Danielle Mericle, dmericle@uoregon.edu
Participant Bios:
DEBBIE REESE is a former school teacher and assistant professor in American Indian Studies and is widely known for her blog, American Indians in Children’s Literature. She is tribally enrolled at Nambé Owingeh, and her blog, articles ,and book chapters about depictions of Native peoples in children’s literature are used in Education, English, and Library Science courses in the US and Canada.
KIMBERLY JOHNSON is a young adult author and vice provost at the University of Oregon.
This Is My America is her bestselling novel that explores racial injustice against innocent Black men who are criminally sentenced and the families left behind to pick up the pieces. She is an award-winning novelist, with 2021 accolades that include the Pacific Northwest Book Award, YALSA Top Ten Best Fiction, NPR Concierge Best Books, Malka Penn Human Rights Award for Children’s Literature, and the ILA Notable Books for a Global Society. Her novel has also been selected for the Spirit of Texas and Humanities of Tennessee 8-12th grade reading programs for their respective States. This Is My America will soon be adapted as an HBO Max series
ELIZABETH A. WHEELER is Professor of English and founding Director of the Disability Studies Minor at the University of Oregon. She researches and teaches intersectional representations of disability and race in young adult and children’s literature, comics, speculative fiction, and public policy. Her 2019 book HandiLand: The Crippest Place on Earth (University of Michigan Press) analyzes the politics of disability in public space in contemporary British and American young adult and children’s literature. Choice selected HandiLand as an Outstanding Academic Title of the year. Her scholarship has appeared in the Journal of Literary and Cultural Disability Studies, Literary Afrofuturism in the Twenty-First Century, Disability Studies and the Environmental Humanities, Children’s Literature Quarterly, and Constructing the (M)other: Narratives of Disability, Motherhood, and the Politics of Normal.
KEITH and CHENOA EGAWA are siblings who co-wrote and illustrated The Whale Child (2020) and Tani’s Search for the Heart (2013). They are both enrolled members of the Lummi Indian Nation.
KEITH EGAWA is a graduate of the University of Washington’s Creative Writing program and author of the novel Madchild Running (Red Crane Books Inc. 1999). Keith’s extensive work experience in the fields of Child and Family Services and Indian Education Reform has provided him with both inspiration and insight into his subject matter. Keith has been awarded several artists grants, in addition to conducting literary readings and presentations within the public schools, and writing workshops for Native youth.
CHENOA EGAWA is a ceremonial leader, singer, speaker, environmental activist, storyteller and artist dedicated to bringing healing to our Mother Earth and to people of all origins. One of her principal teachings today is the importance of preserving and sharing ancestral wisdom and perspectives that benefit the health, well-being and protection of all life.
