Monday 28 January 2013

Diversity in Children’s Books by Abiola Bello



I have always wondered why there is a lack of ethnic characters within Children’s Book. Is it a hidden rule? Like in Hollywood movies where the black guy always dies (apart from in the Deep Blue Sea, LL Cool J lived right to the end)
Growing up reading hundreds of books, even though I could relate to the young girls in the stories, I did wonder why there wasn’t a black girl or even an Asian girl like me as a central character.

When Harry Potter came out, me and my friends (we were a mix of races) were convinced that Hermione was black, only because they described her with bushy hair! I see now, we were just desperate to see something different. I didn’t realise when growing up and writing my own stories that I was falling under the same trap of having the ethnic characters as a background character.

When I first wrote Emily Knight, she was white with brown hair and blue eyes. I thought I was being different because I had made her best friends, Michella Kinkle as a black character, Wesley Parker as mixed race and Jason Notting as Jewish but when I met the amazing Laura Atkins at Roehampton University the first thing she asked me was, ‘Why is Emily white?’ I was very confused. I thought that was the ‘rule’ and Laura was white so I found it even more bizarre that she questioned it. I think I replied with a shrug and she suggested making Emily black.
I wasn’t happy.

First of all, in my head Emily was a white girl and suddenly making her black seemed to change everything. Also, I’m black and I didn’t want to make it a ‘black book.’ But the longer I thought about it, I realised JK Rowling hasn’t made a ‘white book’ cause Harry’s white.
So the moral of the blog is, don’t go with what you think is right or what you think you need to do because that’s the norm. Break the norm. Break the convention. Don’t be afraid to step out of the box and be true to what you believe.

Follow on twitter @emilyknightiam
Emily Knight I AM is now available on all major online retailers
Amazon link http://www.amazon.co.uk/EmilyKnight/dp/146691730X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1356810656&sr=1-1

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3 comments:

  1. Hi Abiola,

    I think it's really sad that you felt children's books had to be about white children. What an indictment of the literary world! I'm so glad you've found your way past that idea. I guess all it proves is that most (published) children's books are written by white people?
    But the great thing about books is that you can make up the visuals in your head. Why shouldn't Hermione be black? You know, I'm going to picture her that way from now on :-D

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  2. Hi Abiola - I just found this and am so glad to have helped you to add your voice, and to reflect the diversity that exists in the UK, but not in the UK's children's books. Write on!

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  3. Wow, brilliant blog. U talked of something that has being on my mind for a bit...nice

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