An article published earlier this week in The New York Times titled “For Young Latino Readers, an Image Is Missing” has created a flurry of commentary about the dire need for more children’s books with which our Latino kids can identify. In other words, more children’s books with characters that look like them and with storylines that speak to them.
While I would love nothing more than to see all Latino authors been given the opportunity to be published, I’m having a hard time accepting that to boost reading skills among Latino children the characters in the books available to them need to look like them, as implied by the article.
First of all, what does a Latino child look like? I thought that the recent brouhaha with Disney’s Princess Sofia reminded us that Latinos come in all shades and colors. At least that’s what we were trying to prove when we asked you to share a photo of your princesa with us. If you visit our #LatinaPrincess Pinterest board, you’ll see that, in effect, our children come from all races, backgrounds and heritages. So, to say that there are not enough books out there for our Latino children to identify with is a lie because there are plenty of books with light-skinned, light-eyed, light-haired protagonists that look just like many Latino children I know — including Camila, Ana’s daughter.
Same thing goes for the Latino experience. What exactly is that? Well, it depends on whom you ask. My Puerto Rican husband’s Latino experience as an American citizen who grew up in La Isla del Encanto is nothing like my Latino experience as a Peruvian citizen who was raised in four countries in three continents before moving to the United States as a teenager. Nor is it anything like that of our own two children who were born and are being raised in the suburbs of Denver, Colorado. With that I’m trying to say that if my 6-year-old daughter reads a story about a Mexican-American child making tortillas with her abuelita, she won’t be able to relate to that at all because she’s not Mexican-American and her abuelita doesn’t even know how to boil water! That, however, doesn’t mean she won’t enjoy the book.
Secondly, whoever thinks children’s love of reading comes solely from whether or not they see themselves reflected in the books they’re reading is completely delusional. As a bookworm who grew up to be a journalist in part because of my love of reading, I can tell you first hand that one thing has very little to do with the other. Let me explain why. I fell in love with books at a very young age because I felt transported to other worlds without having to leave my room. Later on, my love of books continued growing when I saw myself in the characters I read about, not because they looked like me, but rather because I identified with their stories, their hardships, their triumphs. In the end, it’s not about the color of the characters’ skins or their ethnicities, but about the authenticity of their experiences.
Truth be told, though, most of what I’ve always enjoyed reading is stuff I don’t identify with at all. Stories that enrich me and open up my mind to possibilities I didn’t even know existed. Books that teach me about the world around me and expose me to experiences I would not be privy to otherwise.
Now, a lot of people would say I’m lucky — and even unusual — because I grew up in a household full of book lovers, and they’re probably right. I honestly don’t know one single person who loved to read more than my own father who had a book or some other reading material in his hands at all times. I know for a fact that my own love of reading and literary curiosity comes directly from him, which brings me to my next and final point.
While there should definitely be more children’s books written by Latino authors, we should be more worried about whether we’re leading by example when it comes to instilling a love of reading in our children and whether we’re exposing them to all kinds of literature — not just the kind with characters that look like them.
The reason why SpanglishBaby exists today is because more than four years ago, as we were looking for bilingual and Spanish children’s books for our daughters, we realized there weren’t a lot of options. Or those that existed weren’t readily available. We weren’t necessarily looking only for books with characters our children could relate to, but rather for quality bilingual and Spanish-language ones we could enjoy with our girls to help them in their bilingual journey.
While there are not a tons of those out there, we have made it our mission to go in search for them so we can share them with all of you. Hopefully, you can help us spread the word and children’s books by publishing houses like Cinco Puntos Press, Arte Público and Children’s Book Press (now an imprint of Lew & Low) can make kids’ bookshelves more diverse — regardless of their own background and ethnicity.
{Photo by cesarastudillo}
I read your post, I like your approach and agree with your comments 100%. But I think there is something that is broken in Latino families, I personally have seen a lot of Latino families, that because of their busyness, they let the school system and TV take care of their kids. Many parents do not even speak English, so they talk to the kids in Spanish but let the system guide the kids abilities. I do not think it has to do with what they see in the book, or what the character in the book looks like, but it has to do with what the immediate example does to the kid.
Yes, Cecy! There are a lot of other issues that need to be taken into consideration when trying to figure out why so many Latino children are not reading. But as I said in the post, I doubt that no seeing themselves portrayed in the books available to them is the main one.
I know I’m writing from a place of privilege and maybe I should have been more clear, but the main message I was trying to convey is that we need to find a way for children — regardless of their background or heritage — to love reading even if the characters in the books they read don’t look anything like them…
I agree with Cecy that many Latino parents have taken a hands off approach in their child’s education.
1. Because they don’t understand the system and 2. They feel they are not qualified enough. Yes there are a multitude of areas that need to be touched on to educate anyone. Among those are sight words, phonics, picture to word recognition, etc and start introducing the reading format through oral stories.
These are just a few that lead a child to the joy and success of reading.
I agree with a lot of the commentary above, but it is important to keep in mind that the parents here who read Spanglish baby aren’t reflective of the ‘typical’ Latino family in the US. There is a big class divide between our experiences and the experiences of most other Latino families in the US, which explains much of the achievement gap. We concern ourselves with the best educational materials and highest quality dual-immersion schools, but most families are working class families who are just glad that there kids are in school, clean and fed. This is not to fault anyone, but to simply say that we are speaking from a point of privilege and we have to keep that in mind when we try to talk about la Puebla Latina.
That being said…..I would love it if there was a great place for getting the Spanish language literature we buy in Colombia here without having to pay for international shipping, which is super expensive! No need to reinvent the wheel, there are plenty of great authors and publishing houses producing great kids literature in Spanish and bilingual formats in Latin America, we just need to get it to the US.
Agreed, Casey. Thanks for pointing it out. Besides the burden of having to have two or more jobs to help their family make ends meet, I know that for a lot of Latino parents, it is the school’s responsibility to teach their children how to read. Their kids’ education is not something they’re commonly involved in back in their home countries and so there’s a great disconnect in that sense too.
Again, what I was trying to point out is that if you want to teach a child to learn to love books, they don’t all have to make him feel identified or reflected in its characters.
In terms of where to get Spanish language literature, have you checked Let’s Read in Spanish: http://letsreadinspanish.com. I’ve been wanting to write a post about their services and your question just reminded me I still need to do that. Gracias!
Absolutely Roxana, I agree with you 100%! Making kids confident readers is not necessarily about seeing oneself reflected, it’s about skill and pride in accomplishment. We often talk about ethnic cultural differences, but very rarely do we extend our understanding of culture to social class, which is just as important if not more in understanding ourselves and others. This is especially true in the case of public schools here as many teachers come from a far different background than their students. Also, thanks for the link, it looks like they have a really good selection.
I also grew up with a love of reading precisely because, like this author, the stories I read were so different from my own experience. However, as a teacher, I found that sometimes it is helpful to use materials that are close to the student’s roots. For example, I tutored an elementary grade student before who had been in the US for only a few years and was really struggling with reading. By using short stories that were set in her home state in Mexico, she was able to focus more on language comprehension without having to learn new content as well. After that, she used her strengthened reading skills to tackle other kinds of reading materials with much greater success. Using language materials that are close to a child’s own experience are helpful in the earlier stages of learning a new language.
Thank you so much for sharing this with us, Rachel. I was hoping I would hear from teachers and others who have experience teaching kids how to read. I hadn’t thought about how reading something familiar could help a child when they’re just learning a new language. Truth is that the post was hard to write because there are so many different experiences out there and I’m sure each learning situation is different.
Casey voiced what I was going to say 100%! I teach bilingual education and my students come from a very different background. While I understand what the author is saying about her daughter not being able to necessarily identify with abuleita making tortillas makes sense- but my students need those books and need more of them.
I feel that my daughter will be able to read and enjoy, if not identify with racially, most of the stories out there becuase of her class. My students don’t have this luxury and while I do my best to help foster a love of reading in them no matter what the book, I see that they enjoy the books that have characters they can relate to more than anything. It may not necesarily be because the character “looks” like them (my students come in all shades) but the experiences are similar and not that of my middle class upbringing. However, books like these are hard to find, and believe me I’ve looked. When I go to Mexico to visit family I always go to all the bookshops I can find in order to augment my classroom library but unfortunately what I often find are books that have been translated into Spanish- and I already have the English version.
Anyways, the short of it is that we are coming from a place of privilige, and I read the original New York Times article and I couldn’t agree more that my students need more books they can relate to.
How interesting, Ellie! As I said to Rachel, I’m glad to hear the point of view of someone who deals with literacy all day long because, as you said, it all depends on your background.
I must say that your comment made me think about something else… Why do you think you can’t find books your students can relate to even in Mexico? And what exactly are you looking for?
Whenever I go there or to Peru, where I’m from, I spend a small fortune in books for my children written by local authors. My daughter loves these books because she find them fun and intriguing and although she can relate to some of the stories, it’s only because of the universal message they contain: it’s fun to be a kid, ways kids get in trouble, friends are good to each other, etc.
Would love to see what you think about that…
Thank you for writing this article and sharing your thoughts.
I also grew up passionate about reading and books – way before I was able to see myself within the characters. Once I discovered that there were Latino writers and books – it only made me love reading even more!
Great response, Roxana.
Even though I seek out books about Salvadorans for my boys, (because books about Salvadorans are something of a rarity compared to all the books about Mexicans and Mexican-Americans), I’ll be the first to admit that like you, I was a book lover and I have always sought out books for myself that had characters who are very different from me – in fact, the more different, the better!
My thoughts on the original article are similar to yours – my boys don’t need to see someone that LOOKS like them in a story – and I feel like the publishing industry has done a good job of becoming more diverse over the years to reflect the population of the United States… I just want the publishing industry to continue publishing these stories, and to expand into publishing more books with characters that just happen to be Latino/a without it being ABOUT them being Latino/a, know what I mean?
Exactamente, Tracy! We definitely need more books with characters that just happen to be Latino/a (and from other ethnic backgrounds too). The main thing is that, like you said, they “just happen” to be Latino/a as opposed to forcing the issue just so more books have characters that reflect the Hispanic population.
Thanks for your comment!
According to my boys’ teachers, one of the biggest contributors of whether or not boys grow up to be readers is whether they see their dads read. Luckily, my husband is an avid reader (when he’s not watching football!) and so far, reading is a favorite activity for my boys.
I’m a voracious reader, and some of my favorites are about short, petite, blonde, blue-eyed characters–quite the opposite of me. I agree with you, that I got invested in their journey and story because the authors were great storytellers.