Critical Questions/Reading Response Journal: Week 6 Cultural Authenticity in Children's Literature

According to this week's readings, the authors discuss the complexity of cultural authenticity within children's literacy. There are debates regarding the perspectives on who should or should not, can or cannot write from one culture and questions an "outsider" writing about other culture's children's books. Will writers' understanding and experiences of other cultures affect their writing of the stories? How accurate is the message that the writers try to bring to readers? Should an "outsider" gain in depth experiences of other cultures before they begin writing stories of other cultures? If they do not, could they risk writing only stereotypes of other cultures?

According to Short and Fox, "[r]ecognizing the complexity of both insider and outsider perspectives adds another layer to all the issues that have been previously raised, including cultural facts and values and what is considered "truth" about a particular culural experience" (p.20)

There are different perspectives that different people understand about one culture. For instance, even in country like China, we find different culture practices in dfferent cities in China. There will not be only one image or one understanding of Chinese culture. The culture that we practice today will not be the same as the culture that was practiced twenty years ago or even the culture we will practice twenty years from now.

Cultural practices is not fixed, instead, I assume it is actually continually moving. Cultural practices move and change from centuries depending on the historical and social effects on it. When one's understanding encounter another's understanding of the same culture, it influences both of their overall understanding of a particular culture. This process creates a deeper layer of understanding of this culture. Whereas, when one is expressing his perspectives of his own culture, the language he speaks, the words he uses at that moment will not be the same as other people, therefore, I think he is actually making his explanation that only belongs to him. I believe that even when different people are telling the same story to others, it actually creates different effects on others' lives. However, I do agree with Mingshui Cai that "authors who successfully write outside their own culture have had significant in-depth experiences over many years within the culture they portray and have engaged in careful and thorough research". It is not easy and actually complex for writers to write stories outside their cultures. I wonder why do they still want to include people from other cultures in their stories? Are they trying to present the concept of multiculturalism to children through their stories?

What is multiculturalism? Why is it so important to our children? Are multiculturalism simply pictures of children from different countries, wearing dfferent clothes, eating different food, speaking different languages, living different life styles? Are we simplifying the complex of the practice of multiculturalism? Is multiculturalism being romanticized in children's literacy?

Why are adults the one to decide which books should be banned from children's reading? Children's books are banned because books contain contexts such as sexism, offensive language; however, children are experiencing, seeing and hearing us use language that may express these ideas in our daily lives.  Why are we eliminating such connection between children's daily experience with their literacy learning? If authors have the freedom to write, why can't children make their own choices to read?